


The Black Mamba

by MiniPeridot



Category: Pirates of the Caribbean (Movies)
Genre: Canon Related, Canon-Typical Violence, Diverges from Canon at a Certain Point, F/M, Love Trianle, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Pre-Canon, Slow Burn, There's a Reason for the Title, everyone just needs a fucking hug, little dark
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-02-02
Updated: 2020-07-01
Packaged: 2021-02-27 19:55:57
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 16
Words: 33,596
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22531336
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MiniPeridot/pseuds/MiniPeridot
Summary: I just wanted to do a Miguel Magda story. So, enjoy my guilty pleasure story about Miguel and Carina having a romance rather than that forced nonsense she had with Henry (sweet boy, but it felt forced in the movie. Sorry)
Relationships: Armando Salazar/Carina Smyth Barbossa, Miguel Magda/Carina Smyth Barbossa, Officer Magda/Carina Smyth
Comments: 13
Kudos: 49





	1. The Doctor's Logs

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Bella Muerte](https://archiveofourown.org/works/15783429) by [Senneres](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Senneres/pseuds/Senneres). 



> In places where only people who speak Spanish are present, I will use “” but the words will be in English and italics because everyone present is supposed to understand it. Wherever there is Spanish, it will be in italics and in between either “” (talking) or ** (writing). Mostly, when it is in Spanish, even if you don't speak it, it should be obvious from context, but if it isn't, I have a beta reader for this exact reason (thank you Piratesangel)
> 
> This chapter is incredibly short. Most will not be this bad
> 
> So, this chapter won't need any translations. If there are any in the future, I will try to remember to put them at the end or it'll be pretty easy to figure out from context, but I will try to remember to still include the translation so you don't have to google it later

* _Day 53 - Doctor’s Log_

_Officer Cortez’s injury is healing without any signs of infection. Released to return to normal duties this morning. Mr. Hernandez is an uncooperative patient, but a loyal and dutiful soldier. Guard had to be positioned by his bed to prevent him from attempting to return to his po ._

_Wound had to be stitched for the third time. Capitá Sa zar made ound th ou h the Med c l Wi to ns ect the men and th r re v ry. R t nd … … …_ *

With a sigh, a cracked, grey hand gently soothes down the burnt and filthy remains of the page. Closing the logbook, he can still recall that day, but less and less every time he tries.

It was so long ago…

Some of the words, he can still fill in, even if they are destroyed. Turning the charred, half-destroyed book in his hands, he gently sets it down with both hands on the corner of the desk.

As he pulls away, he pauses to adjust its position just a little before leaning back in the musty chair and folding his hands, eyes lingering on the charred binding.

His chin lifts slightly as he looks out over the still and silent room. His eyes slide shut, taking deep, ragged breaths. The air moves through his throat and down to his lungs, but there is something off about it. An emptiness, rather than a fullness in his chest.

He continues though, eyes still shut in the incredibly dark room. Not even a candle or match for so much as a speck of warmth.

For five minutes or five hours, he sat there. Time is elusive here, but he refused to stop. Couldn’t allow it.

In the distance, an oddly rhythmic pounding sounds that gradually grows in volume, but only slightly. There is a slight sting in the air when it stops suddenly, returning the space to an eerie silence.

“... _Miguel?... Miguel? Are you in here?_ ”

A deep, raspy sigh fills the otherwise quiet space. The words were soft, almost a whisper. “ _What do you want, Moss?_ ”

The thudding from earlier returns, but loud and clear now as it gets _very_ close.

“ _Miguel! You need to come up on deck. Nico just spotted a ship. Looks like it’s coming our way._ ” The excitement is not well-hidden in the younger man’s voice at all.

Gold eyes snap open. “ _How far out?_ ”

He grins, showing off now ruined teeth. The cracks in his face spreading and pulling as his lips curl upwards. “ _Minutes._ ”

Cracked lips purse together, eyes narrowing. There is the faintest glint before the eyes darken with a crimson glow with the faintest detectable signs of a smile on his lips. “ _Then what are we waiting for?_ ”


	2. A Rare Opportunity

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Miguel's thoughts are indicated in italics and separated from everything else. Also marked by ~ before it
> 
> Here's where we left off:  
> ***A ship is approaching. Moss and Miguel are climbing up from below deck to join the others.***

The two men make their way through the dark halls, heading for the stairs. Soft, dim light illuminates the stairway. Cracked and chipped wood with paint covered in ash, burnt flesh and dried blood creak under Moss’s feet as they climb to the top deck.

The smell of gunpowder and death hang thick in the air.

Miguel follows the gaze of the crew to the grand, but cursed gate from which the majority of their light came even if marred by a thick fog. Some light also comes from above, but that too is minimal.

Through the gate, he could see it. A mast and… lamps. Must be nighttime outside. Beyond the gate.

He allows himself to close his eyes. After a moment, he frowns. Seems that now, even the night was beginning to elude him. Another item on an ever-growing list.

“ _Here they come!_ ” His eyes snap open, head turning slightly to the left to find Officer Santos there. He must have been the one to say it. Words above a whisper, but not even a shout, though they may as well have been with the deafening stillness of their prison.

Officer Santos could barely stand still, body leaning slightly over the railing as the floating fragments of his once pristine uniform sway restlessly with their master’s impatience.

Dull but poignant thuds ring loud over the tense and waiting deck. The Capitán. A lifetime ago, every man present would have stood at attention, halting inspection of their weapons to give respect to their commanding officer.

Again. That was a lifetime ago and the Capitán would not torment his men these days with waiting on formalities. Not in moments like this where even the often gentle Lieutenant is drawn to the very edges of the ship to wait with bated breath and savage glee.

He did, however, demand a level of command be maintained, even in these times of pain and torment. Every man has a weapon drawn as their… guests proceed through the fog, passing through the gate.

Lungs that hold no breath release their pressure. Bodies lean further forward, but not one step is taken.

The weight of Miguel’s sword grows almost warm in his hand. The Capitán comes into view far down to his left, the uniform unmistakable even in the dim light and through the damage.

This was it. 30 seconds. Max. 10 if the fog cleared around the flag in the next 3.

Miguel focuses his gaze on the side of the new vessel though.

_~...Brig. The fog prevents a precise count but…_

_~… 18 cannons._

_~...100 to 130 men. That is bigger than our last guest…_

_~...2 minutes. 3 at the most… Maybe 4 if any of them try to barricade themselves somewhere on the ship._

Something shifts in the air, his gaze drawn to the crew and the Capitán. He is watching the vessel now. A glance up at the mast confirms it. Pirates

Miguel sets his hand on the rail, counting down in his head.

_~6… 5… 4… 3… 2… 1… Now!_

A sharp rap of the Capitán’s sword on the deck, and they take off, spurred forward by a thirst for blood. Miguel uses his hand on the railing to propel himself over it, landing on the surface of the water with barely a splash and charging ahead at full speed.

Moss is ahead of him, he and several others leading the charge with pure speed alone. Not even 30 seconds and the first of them are on board.

Throats cut, soft grunts, the first five or so fall before the rest can react. 

_~35 seconds._

The soldiers of the Mary are on board and the pirates are firing near blindly.

_~1 minute._

A falling pirate hits an oil lamp and burning oil spills over the deck. The dismal scene is lit exquisitely. Like a small corner of Hell, the fire casts a warm light and sharp shadows over the bodies that litter the deck and the corpses that chase the still-living pirates about.

Miguel glides over body after body towards a small group his comrades have not yet noticed. He moves over the canons to drop down well within arms reach of them.

One. Two. Three.

One in the heart, one slashed through the stomach, and one in the leg. One elegant movement like in a dance.

One dead. Two dying.

_~1 minute 10._

Miguel clicks his tongue, striding away from the spilling blood and cries of pain. The other men will be sweeping in to finish them off shortly.

A quick flick of his wrist and drops of crimson blood abandon his blade in favor of the deck. He pauses as he notices the hatch to below deck is open and unguarded.

He strides towards it, calm and steady. His feet glide over the stairs, the ship does not even creak, almost as though it is unaware of his presence at all.

Miguel moves silently through the far darker innards of the ship, lamps spaced out enough to create large gaps of shadow with small spaces of warm light. He passes a turn.

_~Wait-!_

…That smell…

One step back.

_~1 minute 30. Must be._

He knows that smell. Knows what it means. As though hypnotized, he follows it down the hall and as the smell grows in strength and potency.

The sounds of death fade to a dull and distant song.

_~1 minute 50._

He rounds a corner quickly, his blade up. A room. No! Far better! A medical wing. The candle on the desk is the only light in the room, illuminating the terror in the doctor’s face as his hands shoot up to his shoulders.

On the room’s one bed though… a _patient_?! His sword remains directed at the terrified doctor as he approaches the bed. The man is shaking, a layer of sweat on his skin.

He appears to be too lost in a fever to even register Miguel’s presence. After a moment, he turns to the doctor.

“ _Usted, señor_. What is he here for?”

Silence. One step closer. The man takes one back. Miguel scowls. “ _No me hagas preguntar de nuevo…_  
What are you treating him for?”

His voice is calm and tone level. 

_~How long now?..._

_~2 minutes 15. Probably._

The man swallows. “Are-are you going to kill me?”

Miguel presses his rapier to the man’s throat. “What. Are. You. Treating. Him. For?” His voice and tone do not change.

The man attempts to pull his throat back, twitching like he’s trying to resist breathing or swallowing, for fear of catching the blade.

“M-Malaria!” A pause. A slight press of the blade. Small drops of blood. “Explain… _¡Ahora!_ That means **now** señor!”

The doctor whimpers, trying to stop himself from shaking by gripping the edge of his desk as though a tight-enough hold might save his life.

“I-I don’t know what you want me to say! H-he has fever, chills, aches and sweating. Goes on for hours, stops after sweating, then comes back in a few days. I-it’s only been a week. It’s an early diagnosis, but he has all the signs! Please! Please don’t kill me!”

Miguel’s chin tilts upwards. “ _Malaria?_ ” The word rolls over his tongue and teeth. Warmth spreads through his body. “ _¿Es así como lo llaman ahora?_ ”

The doctor’s brow furrows. “What-?” Miguel’s arm flicks at the elbow, a strong hiss cuts through the air and the doctor falls off his chair, clutching his throat desperately.

Miguel stands there, unmoving. He closes his eyes.

_~How long now?_

... _2 minutes… No! 3! 3 minutes… How long ago did the rest of the crew finish?..._

Footfalls sound, getting closer. They pause at the door. “ _Magda! There you are! …_ ” He must be taking in the dying doctor on the floor and the dying patient in the bed.

“... _Officer Magda?..._ ”

He opens his eyes and spins. Hernandez stares at him from the doorway. “ _How long ago did it stop?_ ” His brow furrows. “ _I’m sorry?_ ”

Clicking his tongue, Miguel picks up a cloth and cleans his blade with a sigh. “ _Nevermind… Was someone looking for me?_ ”

The confusion in his voice is palpable. “ _Well. We all were sir. A few of us also came down to check for any other survivors. Capitán wants to do his inspection as well… Are you alright, sir?_ ”

Miguel was staring at the pirate in the bed, still shaking. “ _Hernandez?... Go and fetch the Capitán and Lieutenant for me would you? I need to discuss something with them before inspection._ ”

——————————

Up on deck, any and every surviving pirate was dragged over and set in a line. Those who were alive, but with severe injuries, were being executed. The remainders sat there, shaking in the face of these specters.

The Capitán stands before all of them. His crew forming lines down the deck. He leans heavily on the cane in his left hand, legs aching but there was no point in sitting. He’d tried early on, but it didn’t help. The pain would be there no matter what he did.

Once everyone was accounted for, he’d begin. For now, they wait. His loyal Lieutenant by his side. A noise comes from said Lieutenant, drawing his attention to the stairs that led below. Hernandez comes up empty-handed, and walks straight for him.

He stands straight and gives a slight bow. “ _Capitán. Teniente._ ” Giving him a nod, Hernandez proceeds, clearing his throat. “ _I found Officer Magda below. He is in the Medical Wing but-_ ”

“ _Unless you are about to tell me that our good doctor has somehow been injured, I cannot help but wonder why he did not return with you. Did you not tell him we are all waiting to start inspection?_ ”

“ _Yes-I mean no! I-I did tell him, sir. However, he asked to speak with you both before we begin._ ”

The two men share a glance and the Capitán nods, sighing heavily. “ _Very well. Take your place Hernandez. This will not be long._ ” Hernandez gives another bow and leaves to join the line-up. With a word to his Officers, Capitán and Lieutenant head for the stairs.

———————————

Down in the Medical Wing, Miguel looks through all the books on the shelves. Every scrap of paper and all the containers. He finds the doctor’s log and starts flipping through the pages, clicking his tongue.

He mutters under his breath in Spanish at the stellar lack of information in the man’s notes. “ _And you call yourself a doctor! One can only wonder if or how any of your patients survived when you take such abhorrent notes._ ”

“ _Officer Magda. I do hope we are not interrupting, though I hope even more that you are aware of how late you are for inspection._ ”

Turning, he finds the Capitán and Teniente in the doorway, slowly entering. The Capitán takes in the man on the floor and the breathing one in the bed. “ _Why is he not dead?_ ”

Miguel steadies his tongue, giving a quick bow to both men. “ _Capitán Salazar. I was hoping I might persuade you to alter tradition today._ ” Not to his surprise, that is met with a raised eyebrow and a look of concern in the Lieutenant’s eye.

“ _...Elaborate._ ”

Miguel nods. “ _Gladly. As you can no doubt see, gentleman. This pirate is quite ill. Now, I know what it is you are going to tell me to do, but I was hoping I might convince you to let me keep him alive for treatment._ ”

Salazar stiffens, lips pursing as he tries to contain his anger. “ _Officer Magda. If you cannot manage the most compelling case ever made on behalf of a pirate, I will see you confined to your office indefinitely!_ ”

The Lieutenant’s look of warning was unneeded. He knew how much trouble he’d be in if he could not persuade his stubborn captain. Being locked in his office for the rest of eternity would be a good thing compared to if his words angered him further.

Instead, he smiles, “ _Gentlemen. Tell me. Do you know what Malaria is?_ ” Both men frown. After a moment, both shake their heads. Miguel smiles.

“ _Actually. You do. It just didn’t have that name before. You see, so much has changed in the world in however long we have been imprisoned here… I am a doctor without patients on a ship with a crew who cannot even bleed…_ ”

He steps away to show them the books and notes in the small office. “ _Medicine continues to change outside those walls and yet… We are disconnected from it. If an unnamed illness can have a common name by now, who knows what I am missing… However, I believe that this prison actually manages to create the perfect opportunity for medical advancement._ ”

“ _Are you actually implying that this prison without any daylight or escape could in_ **_any_ ** _way benefit us?_ ” The venom in Salazar’s voice was palpable, staining the air.

Miguel takes a deep breath, turning to face him dead on.

“ _Not us sir. No. At least, not yet. But, for the first time anywhere, there is an opportunity to experiment on a medical condition without any risk of the condition spreading to those involved in treatment. We have a chance to experiment on this…_ ** _rat_** _and expedite recovery for all cases going forward. Even if whatever I do for him fails, and he dies, even there, there will be some information of value to be found! And, if one day we are indeed free of this prison_ ** _and_** _our curse. What do we do if one of our men contracts it, hm? Would I not be better equipped to fix them in a matter of days if you allow me time to study the illness now? The man is dead either way. If he dies, we will know what not to do or what may or may not lessen his suffering in his final moments. If he lives, the men can execute him. Either way, if you let me treat him, then his death will be a benefit to this crew. To Spain. To medicine. To all of humanity even!_ _But if we just kill him now, then we will never know…_ ”

Silence fills the space as the Capitán ponders his words. The Lieutenant seemed intrigued by the idea from what glances had told him during his plea.

The silence seems to drag on forever until, subtlety, Salazar smiles. “ _You make an interesting claim, Officer…_ ” He heaves a ragged, pained breath. “ _Ohhh, very well. You may work on him. I will send men down after inspection to help you gather things you will need. For now, write up a list for them…_ ”

He turns and leaves the room without another word. The Lieutenant gives Miguel a look. “... _Something on your mind, Guillermo?_ ”

He sighs. “ _hope you know what you’re doing, Miguel…_ ”

With that, he turns to follow the Capitán back up to the top deck. Miguel’s lips turn up in a smile, turning to his new patient. “ _Were you not a filthy pirate… I might actually thank you for getting me out of inspection._ ”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Translations: 
> 
> Usted, señor. - You, sir
> 
> No me hagas preguntar de nuevo - Don't make me ask again
> 
> ¡Ahora! - Now!
> 
> ¿Es así como lo llaman ahora? - Is that what they call it now?


	3. On the Run

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This story will shift perspective as it goes along. Thanks again to Piratesangel for being my beta reader
> 
> ***Saint Martin, the West Indies. 6 years later  
> (Carina’s POV)***

_~Keep moving! Don’t stop!_

There’s not one day in her life that she has not spent cursing the very existence of heeled shoes or for their being a staple of women’s fashion. They are so incredibly impractical!

Nevertheless, she managed to learn to run in them.

Winding through the streets of Saint Martin, she keeps her eyes open for tricky routes and turns to take.

The aggravated voices of the redcoats were loud, but far enough behind that she felt she could still get away. It also sounded like they were shoving civilians out of their way.

Spotting some chickens in a large cage, she quickly pauses to open the gate, giving it a quick hit before tearing off at full speed.

The chickens hurried out of the cage in a mad fury of feathers, clucking and confusion. By the sounds of things, the soldiers are forced to slow down more because of the owner trying to gather his chickens and yelling at the soldiers for kicking him.

A few minutes and a lot of turns later, Carina finally allows herself to stop running and take a break behind a tavern. Sitting down on some crates, she slides her shoes off to rub her aching feet one at a time. Life here had almost become peaceful until someone found her trying to map her prediction for where one of the stars she’d been tracking would be tonight.

Now, she’s been declared a witch and has absolutely wasted the day running from the guards.

As she sets her shoes back on, she spots a rat scurrying by and stopping not far away. A cat slinks up behind it slowly. She watches for a while, wishing she had any hand for drawing this intriguing sight.

The cat is less than a foot from its prey when it stops, turning fast to the entrance of the alley. Leaning out cautiously, she jerks back quickly at the sight of bright red uniforms.

The rat begins to move again, the cat still watching the men. Without much time to think, she carefully sets out her foot and steps on the rat’s tail. It squeaks and panics, giving the cat time to pounce as her foot retreats. She takes off running down between the buildings.

Some soldiers spot her as she comes out onto the main road and dashing across to another alley.

This was getting incredibly tiring and frustrating.

As she turns a corner, she ends up running right _into_ a pair of redcoats who grab her in a panic. Despite her struggling though, they are much bigger than she is.

“Not so fast witch! You’re _done_ running!” One of the men sneered at her, “let’s go. I’m _done_ chasing you all over town!”

As they pushed her forward through the crowds, she glances at the sun.

3 hours. It’s about 3 or 4 hours of eluding guards since she was called out as a witch this morning. No wonder she was so exhausted.

As they drag her along, they encounter another group that had apparently been looking for her. “Is that her?!” The younger of the two ahead exclaimed.

“Yes. This is her. Now let’s get some irons on her before she slips away again shall we?”

At that she starts to squirm again, trying to get even one arm free. One of the men holding her twists the arm he is holding behind her back a little too far, earning a cry from her.

“That’s _quite_ enough! I’ll not spend the entirety of my day chasing after you. Now _hold still_!” Gritting her teeth, she resigns to stay relatively still as one of the soldiers secures a manacle to the wrist still in front of her before they bring her other arm around to lock it to the other end of the chain.

She glares at them, hating them and the people holding her. Her anger also granted her the opportunity to study the lock a bit on each wrist. If she had enough time, she could probably figure out how to unlock them.

Meanwhile, one of the men in front of her stares at her sharp cheekbones and bright, intelligent eyes. “Huh… I haven’t seen many witches in my time, but I honestly expected her to be ugly. Is this what they normally look like?”

She rolls her eyes up to look at him without raising her head. How was it truly possible for so many men and women to be _this stupid_?!?

One of the other men was already answering his question and she regrets missing it. Although it probably would only have made her angrier.

With plenty more struggling and sounds of annoyance from both parties, the men manage to escort her to the fort. As they enter, a man in an officer’s uniform is heading out and the men stop.

“Leftenant!” They click their guns against the floor in place of a more proper salute, as they were still holding her. He nods, taking her in.

She meets his gaze head on, not swayed by his glare in the slightest bit. He scoffs. “This is the witch reported this morning?”

Her eyes narrow at him and she clenches her fists.

“Yes sir!” The man to her right answered promptly. The Lieutenant’s gaze never broke from her own though. It seemed they were locked in a staring contest, trying to find the other’s weakness or drop in defenses first.

Finally, he speaks. “...Took you long enough. Take her downstairs. She hangs at dawn with the others.” With that, he brushes past them with the other men he’d been with and she is once again pushed forward by men who can’t handle women of greater intelligence than them.

As they pass the cells, filthy, drunken wrecks of men jeer at them. The moment one starts asking which cell she was going to be placed in though, every cell ahead was joining.

Disgusting, unwashed hands reach out through the bars to try and touch her. The men holding her ignore them entirely, not even _one_ beration about their behavior, or the disgusting taunts they made at her.

Fortunately, one of her captors is between her and the cells, so they can’t reach her, and there is some further comfort when they take her to an entirely empty cell several down the hall from the nearest of the disgusting rats that claim to be men.

Once locked inside, the soldiers leave the same way they came.

_~...So perhaps there is only one way out of the prisons. If there was a faster way back to their posts, they would’ve taken it._

Heaving a sigh, she sits on the dusty, dirty bench in her cell, carefully lifting the skirt of her dress on the side the men were not on, and only enough to reach under and locate a small set of tools she had strapped to her leg.

Sliding them out, she examines them to make sure they’re still intact.

————————————

Some time later, no more than 2 hours by her guess, footsteps filled the hall and she adjusted the grip on her tools in each hand to press them flush against her skin.

A priest walks up to her cell and motions her forward. “Carina Smyth?” He asks as she steps forward. “...Yes…”

He must have gotten her name from the people that she had befriended around town and probably more information once that man had cried ‘witch’.

The man begins a bible passage and she decides to tune him out, instead focusing on getting her tools discreetly into the lock on her door. It was rather foolish of these places to have locks on the inside but it was fortunate they did now.

She doesn’t look up again until he says her name, followed by the crime she was being charged with. Mentally, she sighs, but outwardly, she puts on a mask of reverence and shame, one that she’s found priests to accept on any occasion.

There was no real conflict for her with men of God, but the whole idea of a deity was far too vague and illogical for her to support so she’d abandoned religion long ago. The men and women of the church though, aside from being very fearful, uneducated and closed-minded people, she had always found them to be very kind.

As people, she had the least problem with them. As far as their beliefs dominating society’s mind more than hard facts and logic though… that irritated her relentlessly. The clicks were coming smoothly. Shouldn’t be long now.

The priest asks her if she has anything to confess and she suppressed the urge to scoff at him.

Pushing her anger and indignation aside as far as she could, she answers. “I confess that I am _not_ a witch. That I am a woman of _science_.”

She takes a breath.

_~Almost there…_

“I confess that I have survived on my own with nothing but a diary from the father I never knew and a _quest_ for the truth of who I am.”

Women were given so little respect regarding true intelligence. Even less were given to orphans who had no strong male role models…

“I confess that I will _die_ before I give up the search.” 

The words rang in her ears, like the sound of a blade being drawn from its sheath. She meant it to. Always curious, even as a child, she was never given any answers about her father, or her mother. She entered that orphanage with nothing but a name, a diary, and the word of the nuns that her father was the one who dropped her off, but they insisted they never saw him. Only read a letter he had left behind, but they’d never given it to her. Not even a reason why.

The gears were clicking along nicely though. She could feel the mechanism about to give. She just needed to keep talking and distract him for a few more seconds.

“And I confess…” as the gears click into place and the click she’d been waiting for cake, a realization hit her that the priest had entered from a different direction than the soldiers had left her earlier.

Suppressing a grin, she looks up at him from behind the bars of her cell. Finishing her thought with a smile of victory below the surface, “that while we’ve been talking, I picked this lock.”

With that, she pushed the door into the priest hard enough to knock him on his back and ran off down the hall in the direction _he_ had come, already working on one of her manacles as she went.

She moved quickly as she could, hiding at every turn and holding her breath whenever a group was nearby. Somehow though, she made it outside and, sure enough, it wasn’t nearly as crowded with soldiers as the other way had been.

She ran off through the streets, pausing behind a building to finish unlocking the manacle on her left wrist. Being right-handed, that one would end up being harder, so it would have to wait.

During her wait, she’d overheard soldiers talking about some man from one of their ships wash ashore, mumbling about ghosts and the Trident of Poseidon but his sleeve was torn, so he’d be convicted as a prisoner like her. It would be a risk to see a man from a navy ship so soon after escaping, but she _had_ to risk it.

She needed to get off of Saint Martin and only a wanted man would agree to sail with a wanted woman.


	4. Under the Blood Moon

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> ***She needed to get off of Saint Martin and only a wanted man would agree to sail with a wanted woman.***

A quick stop at an astronomer’s shop. That’s all it should have been.

Of course it wasn’t though. It couldn’t possibly go that simply could it? She’d even offered to pay him double for selling to a woman, not that that should really have been an issue. She’d even fixed his equipment so his map would actually be precise.

Though naturally, he was offended and immediately jumped to the conclusion that she was a witch. Further proof that men refuse to accept that women can be intelligent, especially more intelligent than them.

It didn’t help when a pirate showed up. He’d clearly been drunk out of his skull. Especially when he asked the  _ two _ people in the room if any of the  _ four _ of them had seen his  _ bank _ of all things! Of course, then a building crashed into the man’s shop and the pirate loudly declared that he’d found it.

He smelled like he had been soaking in rum for a month. And then, to top it all off, he ended up pushing her off a roof! Who was to say if he even knew the cart was  _ there _ !

She barely managed to get away from the soldiers that chased the cart. It was almost panic-inducing to wait as they ran past her.

She snuck around, feeling incredibly stupid for having to sneak back towards the fort. The infirmary was a separate building but effectively next to it, allowing family to visit their beloved husbands and sons when in recovery. It also made it easier for the nuns to come and go as they needed to between it and the convent next door.

It took a lot of patience to get into the area where the man was supposedly being kept. Even more to sneak around and steal a nun’s robes to put on over her own dress.

Thankfully, she finds a nice, isolated area to work on her other manacle, putting her tools back in their case on her leg before hiding the manacles and slipping out among the other women present.

She keeps her head down as she finally enters the hall to the main infirmary. Soldiers pass by, so she plays along like just another shy, quiet sister of the convent.

It takes her longer than she’d prefer to find the room the patients are in, but she does. Spotting a key on the wall, she slips it off it’s hook when no one is looking and hides it in her sleeve.

After a scan of the room, Carina immediately tips her head down.

The Lieutenant from earlier is in here with another officer. Not wanting to risk being recognized, she carefully notes what the sisters are doing so she can copy them and blend in.

Refilling water, getting water in a bowl and taking a clean cloth to clean up the blood or dirt on a patient. As she dares to drift closer, she overhears them talking to the young man in the bed.

The Lieutenant sounds angry.

Apparently the man had indeed come ashore after rowing himself from the middle of the sea to Saint Martin on a piece of driftwood… Must have been more than just one piece of driftwood connected together. That couldn’t support a man’s weight on its own.

His sleeve is torn… So he  _ is  _ going to be tried as a traitor, but for being a coward, not a mutineer. That she can live with. Being arrested for wanting to live would not be a bad thing. It could have been worse. She could have gotten here to find out he’d strangled his commanding officer.  _ This _ she could live with.

The officers finally leave and she heads over to him to clean up the blood and dirt on his forehead. Just like all the others, he mistakes her for a nun as she sits down to speak with him.

The moment he starts talking about curses though, she has to resist rolling her eyes. Yet another person who believed in the absurdity of magic over logic.

“You  _ do _ know that curses are not supported by science?”

Carina shouldn’t have expected that to work at this point, and of course, it didn’t.

Annoyed, she redirects the conversation back to the Trident. Unfortunately, her conversation is cut short by soldiers screaming to grab her.

With not much time, she slips the key out of her sleeve and shoves it in his hands. “Get us a ship, and the Trident will be ours”, she whispers it as quickly as she can before running down the length of the room to the nearest exit.

Regretfully, soldiers were coming from that direction too, cutting off her escape and pushing her hard into the nearest wall to clasp new manacles on her wrists. Behind her back this time.

The only good news was that the young man had gotten away in the confusion.

Feeling a small sense of victory and hope, they haul her off back to the fort. This time, to a more secure area of the prison. A more secluded area with guards coming by more frequently. No window on the wall, but the ceiling was a large, heavy-looking grate.

When they left her alone, she got out of the nun’s clothes, thankful that her own dress was underneath. When a guard came by, she handed it to him through the bars. It took him at least a full minute and a half to take it, apparently thinking she’d used magic to change and that the clothes were now somehow contaminated.

He finally takes it and goes about his patrol, looking incredibly uncomfortable.

As night finally came, a meager meal of some cold stew and stale bread, she leaned against the wall, at least thankful that they freed her hands.

She picks at the bread, but after a few sips of the awful stew, she couldn’t bring herself to finish it.

Carina eats as much of the bread as she can but can’t bring herself to finish it. There is a good chance that that young man she got captured freeing today will just run off and save his own life. There was no guarantee he’d come back for her whatsoever.

The knowledge that this may very well be her last night makes her lose her appetite. There isn’t even a lot of it left, but she can’t do it. It was starting to taste like regret in her mouth. Not that such a thing had a taste, but each bite worsened the feeling in her.

The moon was high in the sky, bathing her cell in a soft light. As the night wore on, it soon turned darker. Looking up, she gasps. Carina had nearly forgotten about tonight’s blood moon!

Hurriedly, she reaches under her dress and pulls out her most prized possession, the diary left to her by the father she’d never known.

The ruby embedded in the cover starts to glow as the blood moon overtakes the sky. For the first time she’d ever known, the jewel was glowing, reflecting the light beautifully. There was something about the light that seemed to be affecting the leather on the cover.

Confused, she manages to pull the jewel off the cover, hovering it over the soft leather. As she does, she sees soft lines that had never been present before, suddenly become illuminated under the red light.

Some kind of ink that was only reflective under red light? How strange… and incredibly fascinating!

As she reached the bottom of the book, she gasped softly. “An island?... That’s it! The stars lead to an island! That’s it!” She has to contain her excitement and volume as she hurriedly opens the pages, finding more invisible ink spread over the pages with more notes and clues.

The guards had effectively stopped their rounds for the night, so she had plenty of privacy as she takes out a tool from her case to start working.

Her hand flies over the stone as she scratches out her calculations. She had to work fast, before the blood moon faded and she lost her clues. Even without them, she had a solid place to start from.

Her charcoal pen scratched over blank pages of the diary, copying some of her calculations down for later. Just to make absolutely certain she wouldn’t lose them.

Her morning date with the gallows was a distant memory now. Her all but empty stomach’s complaints are silent against the sound of her work. 

Body and mind are being fueled entirely by this fascinating discovery, and the now within-reach possibility of finishing her lifelong quest.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> What's this? A pattern perhaps? No. I actually only allot them the time they need. This is an area that still partially follows the shifting perspective from the movie. It will not always be 2 chapters per perspective or 2 chapters each day that I post... Sorry


	5. No Rest for the Weary

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> ***Body and mind are being fueled entirely by this fascinating discovery, and the now within-reach possibility of finishing her lifelong quest.***
> 
> (The Silent Mary, The Devil’s Triangle. Same day as the blood moon over Saint Martin. A few hours before the blood moon rises)

The pen scratches over parchment as Miguel takes notes from today’s findings. Over the past six years, the Capitán had grown to accept the new policy his doctor had pushed for and even asked for a daily report on their condition. There was something undeniably warm and familiar about being asked for a report on a patient.

He didn’t ask for a paper report though, as would have been standard for a crewman before. He claimed they didn’t merit one. Progress was indeed being made though. About half the beds in the room now filled with a sick pirate, feet and hands chained to their beds.

Even if they manage to get out of those, they won’t get far. Where would they even go anyway? A soft whine sounds from just a foot away and he turns to see María staring at him from the floor.

He tries to ignore her for now. She wants her dinner. Like every day. It had been incredible when she’d come aboard. The entire crew was greatly surprised when the Capitán permitted it.

He almost laughs at the memory. A group of pirates huddled together at the back of a cell in the brig of a British vessel. Bracero got one to step forward and María’s snarls and barks had them instantly retreating from the door. Probably the only reason Salazar permitted bringing a living dog on a ship of dead men who could not get food for her.

Their cook had certainly been startled. Then again, he had spent years having no motivation to even wander the carcass of the once glorious Silent Mary until he was told he had to feed a bunch of pirates in the Medical Wing. Like Miguel, he’d spent most of his time in his workspace on the ship. Nothing to do but stare at a wall and consider what options remained for them with no crew to tend to.

It was hard to say which news had been more surprising to the cook. Pirate prisoners on the Mary and he was to feed them, or being told to make a plate of food for a dog…

Nevertheless, little María brought  _ some _ pleasantness to this place, however little. On the bad days, she was annoying and no one wanted to be around her. On the good days, some of the men could be seen laughing as they’d throw things down the deck for her to fetch. Most days were like now though, where it seemed only Miguel still knew she was here.

Of course, living as a guard dog in the Medical Wing most of the time made that pretty easy. Most of the men didn’t bother to come down here since they’d just be tempted to strangle the patients.

Finishing his notes for the day, he goes to stand, only to find María staring at him. He sits, turned in his seat as she stares up at him expectantly.

He’d never had a dog. His mother preferred cats. He never knew what to do around these entirely different creatures. Cats, he could handle. They were quiet, observant, and mostly patient animals.

Mentally, they were hunters. Dogs behaved like everyone around them were family. Cats acted like part of the crew. If they trusted you, you could pet them and hold them. Dogs expected and wanted it. It was easy for them to trust from the get-go, not unlike the sort of drunks at a bar who just want to share love with everyone. So to be faced with an animal that thrives on obvious expressions of emotion is quite awkward for him to deal with.

Which brings him to his current problem. María is going to try and get attention from him at this moment. Several years of her doing this exact thing every day taught him that.

Shifting, he moves to stand and walk around the other side of his desk. As he rounds it to walk through the length of the room to the exit, he freezes. María has come around, excitedly staring at him as though to join him.

The cats his mother kept would follow him or not as they chose. He never had to deal with an animal that would try to follow from in  _ front _ of him before María. For some reason, she insists on trying to do this to him all the time.

He moves to step around her and she continues this, coming close to his legs as though to press against them as they walk. She always seems to want to make a game of trying to grab at his non-existent legs and running quickly under his floating torso.

...And she is starting this game again now.

His eyes narrow as his invisible legs swing over the floorboards and María alternates between barking and snapping at his legs, and jumping through the near-empty space.

Finally, he pulls himself to an abrupt halt, the excited pup wandering a few feet ahead of him.

“ _ ¡ _ **_Suficiente_ ** _! That is  _ **_quite_ ** _ enough! _ ” She whimpers and backs off, ears tucked back. La María creaks around them. The dog looks around for the source of the noise, but Miguel doesn’t have to look far. He takes a moment, trying to figure out what it was she said.

She’s probably chastising him for yelling at the dog that shares her name. She had become extra-talkative since the furball had come aboard. The crew often make jokes that it is because she is currently the only woman aboard and there is no way the ship will permit any harm to come to her.

With a loud sigh, he heads for the exit again, “ _ Manolo, cuida al perro. _ ” His assistant nods from his desk near the door and takes hold of María’s collar. He keeps hold of her to keep her inside the cabin while his mentor leaves.

As Miguel moves through the near pitch-black halls of the Mary, he encounters only the cook and his assistant. He gives them a nod as they address him. With plates of food in their arms, they pass him to go feed the only living souls on board. They weren’t soldiers so there was no risk to his patients at their hands.

Heading to the nearest hatch to the main deck, something seems off in the normally-still air.

He pauses on the first few steps as he listens, trying to place the unfamiliar sound.

...Cracking?... Wait! No... _Rocks_ _cracking_?!

Miguel races up the last of the steps to look for the source, only to have to shield his eyes against a blinding ray of light. Blinking against it, he finally finds the source of the noise. The tallest rock structure that made up the walls of their prison was crumbling. The whole crew is in shock.

La María is creaking, her wheel spinning on its own. The crew is spreading her words from Bracero. “ _ Sparrow! Sparrow gave away his compass?! _ ” “ _ What? What does that mean? _ ” “ _ Does The Mary know what she’s talking about? _ ”

Miguel gasps as warm light hits his face.

From nearby, Officer Reyes silences them. “ _ Gentleman!! It matters not  _ **_why_ ** _ it is happening. Look! Our prison is being destroyed! We can see daylight! Who cares  _ **_how_ ** _ it is working! We are  _ **_FREE!!_ ** ”

And he was right. Every wall is gone. La María turning into the sun with a satisfied groan of her timbers. A shout rings over the deck following Reyes’ statement.

“ **_WE ARE FREE!_ ** ” Shouts and cheers fill the open air as the men are overcome with indescribably joy and relief.

Miguel tips his head up to the sun like much of the crew, a smile on his face. The first, real smile to grace his features in decades.

From by the helm, he hears their Capitán trying to get their attention. La María groans, and everyone turns to where the Capitán stands.

“ _ Now now, gentleman. It is time… _ ”, he pauses to take a ragged breath, “ _ to hunt a pirate. _ ” Even from halfway down the deck, Miguel can see the old glint of a fire in Salazar’s eyes. He wants blood. Their celebration will have to come later. Now, it is back to their old work.

Miguel remains where he is as the crew moves around, looking for their old stations and no doubt looking to figure out what they can still do to get La María moving forward faster. Salazar raps a rhythm with his cane up on the quarterdeck. Miguel doesn’t even hear it. Reyes has to get his attention.

The officers all move toward the quarterdeck. Someone is left at the helm as Salazar directs his officers into his cabin.

They gather around his desk and Salazar takes a deep breath before speaking.

“ _ Now… I know the men will want to celebrate our freedom… I do not blame them for this but we cannot rest. Not yet. From here on out, we are not only to act like proper men of the Armada, but we will not stop until Sparrow is dead, and we are free of our Curse. _ ”

Some of the officers exchange glances, wondering where he is going with this.

“ _ That being said… We do not know how much of what we lost to the Curse will be restored when it is broken, so we will need to gather more supplies and provisions.” _

That is a fair point. When their curse is broken, who is to say La María will be fully restored. If not, she will need lumber, new sails. They would need new lamps, oil, food, water, new supplies for the kitchen… this would be a lot of work…

No one speaks. They know that what follows will be their orders in this matter. Salazar looks around the room, ensuring he has their absolute attention before proceeding.

“ _ Moss. You will make a sweep of the entire ship. Take Bracero with you. Make note of anything and everything that is in need of repairs. _ ”

Antonio nods. Salazar turns to Chris next.

“ _ Lopez. Go talk to Carlo in the kitchen and have him give you a list of what he’ll need. Then, get some men and start straightening up around here. Clean up the cabins and get them to work on cleaning the deck. The Mary has been stained for too long… _ ”

He gives a slight bow. “ _ Yes sir. _ ”

The Capitán looks around the room and nods to himself.

“ _Cortez, you are to check the crew’s quarters. They will need clean sheets and hammocks._ _Santos, go down to the hold. Make space for the new supplies and dedicate spaces for the new inventory._ ”

The men respond with a curt ‘ _ yes sir _ ’ in unison.

“ _ Reyes… _ ” Salazar addresses his gunnery officer next.

“ _ Your task is to go around the ship and bring me a rifle and cannon count. We will need to know how many guns we are missing and where they are. Preferably, we will avoid getting any of our guns from pirates. I would rather purchase new guns in a port, and only if ours are not restored when we are. _ ”

He nods, grinning widely. “ _ I can do that. _ ”

Salazar turns to address Miguel next. “ _ Magda. Make up a list of medical supplies you and Manolo are in need of. We can gather some off of pirate ships if they are any good when we find them. And… _ ”

Salazar sighs, as though the next words passing his lips pained him. “ _ Go check on Montaña… Tell him the good news and… let me know if you get any response out of him… _ ” Miguel nods.

Like the cook, Montaña was one of those who fell into a quiet, depressive state not too long after their imprisonment. Unlike Carlo and the others though, he has yet to come out of it.

Finally, he turns to his Lieutenant.

“ _ Guillermo. You and I are going to plot our course. _ ” He nods silently. At last, Salazar turns to address the entire room.

“ _ One last thing gentleman… It pains me to even think about it, but… Some of our men no longer have hands with which to work so… The Mary will need to start taking prisoners. Therefore, we will need to ensure that the brig is at least in a functional state before we come upon any pirate ships. The Mary does not need us to keep her moving these days, so we have some time and free hands to get this work done. I expect no delays or excuses for not getting your tasks completed before sunrise. Understand? _ ”

Every voice in the room answers. A resounding chorus of “ _ yes Capitán! _ ” He nods to them. “ _ Good. Dismissed. _ ”

The officers file out of the cabin, each branching off when they are clear of the doors to begin their tasks.

The Silent Mary taking prisoners eh?... Miguel almost chuckles at the thought. With Salazar as Capitán, he never thought he’d see the day… No matter. That would just give the men something to do with their time since sailing isn’t really something they can do right now.

He glides past the other officers and the confused, but waiting crewmen on deck as he heads for the hatch back to the Medical Wing. He would relieve Manolo and give him a chance to come up and enjoy the sunlight while he works on the list. It should be quick work. He’s been working on it for a while now.

As he returns to his office, he can’t help noticing the light now sweeping through the beams of the ship. He pauses in the hall, holding up his cracked, grey hands into the soft rays of golden light. Miguel stays there for a while. He’s not sure how long, but it is long enough for Chris to come by with a sizable group, heading for their cabins to start cleaning up.

Withdrawing his hand, he watches as the men pass by. He takes in their charred and damaged bodies, reeking of blood and gunpowder.

_ ~… Soon. We have to find a cure for this soon. _

A chilling thought settles in his mind. What if, when they break the curse, that is it? What if the curse simply stops animating them?

What if, when the curse is broken, they all die?...

Miguel watches as the men disappear down the hall and shakes himself out of his daze. No! It can’t be that! After all they have suffered, God could not possibly be so cruel! No. No this curse was like a disease in the world. It had to be.

Terrifying and seemingly-unbeatable at first, but, once a cure is found, the nightmare ends…

Straightening his back, he swears he will not allow himself to consider that possibility again. He would treat this like any other case. If he treats it like a disease, then he would not stop until he found a cure!

They are  _ all _ his patients now. And not until their skin glows with life again will he stop searching for a cure!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ¡Suficiente! - Enough!
> 
> Manolo, cuida al perro. - Manolo, take care of the dog.


	6. Close Calls

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> ***They are all his patients now. And not until their skin glows with life again will he stop searching for a cure!***
> 
> (Saint Martin. The following morning. Carina's POV)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, Raoul Silva and Miguel Magda are competing for my attention, so I decided to post a chapter for each of them today. Hard to get shit done in the real world with them distracting me though XD Thanks again to piratesangel on Tumblr for being my beta and being amazing <3

Carina is woken roughly very early in the morning by the guards pulling her to her feet.

_~When did I fall asleep?_

She panics as she checks the floor of her cell, relief fills her to not see her diary on the floor, a familiar weight on her leg where she keeps it confirms it’s there.

She can’t remember when she passed out, but by how tired she is, it must have been late... or early? It’s hard to say.

The relief is short-lived though as they tie her hands behind her back and haul her away. Shouts and jeers fill the prison as she is led out to a carriage that’s effectively a giant cage on wheels.

She’s shoved in along with a handful of other women. Another is thrown in after her before they shut the doors and start off. Looking around at her fellow captives, it’s clear that they aren’t witches.

Primarily, of course, is because witches don’t exist. Secondly, because every one of them seems mentally unstable. Not magical in the slightest.

They bare their teeth, clothes filthy… These women were driven into madness, not witchcraft. They needed doctors, not a noose.

She doesn’t speak though. There’s no point. These men aren’t going to listen to her anyway.

The carriage rolls over the bumpy roads and arrives in the town square, making its way through a break in the crowd of angry, shouting citizens.

Glancing around the square, her eyes land on the noose, hanging from a raised platform in the middle of the crowd. Sounds muffle for a moment and her mouth goes very dry.

She’s woken from her momentary trance by tight hands grabbing her arms and an annoyed, but maliciously gleeful voice speaks from the exit. “You’re first _witch_!”

The moment her feet hit the ground, they protest. Oh yeah, all that running yesterday. Of course her feet hurt. She lets them push her through the crowd, if only because she can’t think of anything better to do right now.

Her mind flashes back to that young man she saved yesterday. If he was serious about the Trident, hopefully he’d come to save her… this would be an excellent time to do so.

She’s forced up the stairs and directed to the platform under the rope. She swallows a lump in her throat as she can feel the weakness of the board beneath her feet.

She nearly screams as the loop is placed over her head but she clenches her jaw to silence herself.

_~I’m not gonna let them know how scared I am. They don’t deserve the satisfaction of my fear._

On another platform across from her, a pirate was being strapped to a board and was now lying on his stomach under the waiting blade of the guillotine.

Carina wasn’t sure which would be worse but she forces herself to speak. She’s an intelligent, logical woman of science and that is how she is going to die.

“Final words of Carina Smyth…” Getting that out was hard. It makes things all the more real. She pauses though as the crowd continues to scream. Her brow clenches and she outright screams. “ **QUIET!!** ”

It’s almost startling how quickly they shut their mouths, but it’s about time. Not wanting to lose her newfound confidence, she immediately proceeds.

In the middle of her speech though, the pirate speaks up and, to her disbelief, it’s the same one from yesterday that had barged into the astronomer's shop and pushed her off a roof.

She tries to remain polite in telling him to shut his disgusting mouth so she could finish but he becomes indignant. He actually starts complaining that he’s under the guillotine instead of waiting for the noose like she was.

What kind of idiot cares _this_ much about how they die. You’re still being murdered for the entertainment of idiots by idiots with slightly more power than the rest of them. What difference does it really make?

In the stands set up for the town’s officials and higher-ups, the Lieutenant’s familiar voice rings out. “ **Enough**! Kill them both!” The crowd cheers, eager to get on with the slaughter.

Carina’s heart pounds in her ears as her executioner reaches for the lever that will drop the board under her feet.

Suddenly, a scream breaks the air… It’s not one of fear and… it sounds like a man. She turns with the crowd to the noise to see it’s not even a man. Well, technically by age he’s a man, but Carina has always felt it’s a matter of mental, rather than physical development.

The young ‘traitor’ she’d freed yesterday swings down on a long rope from the clock tower, slamming into one of the soldiers. It takes them seconds to grab him though.

Well… that wasn’t really much of a plan. Evidently she would be dying today after all.

The sneer in the Lieutenant’s voice is audible as he taunts the young man’s false bravado. To her surprise, and intrigue, he responds that he’s just a diversion.

A cannon goes off and she flinches. Fortunately, it was aimed at the guillotine… for some reason. It actually hits a supporting beam and the pirate ends up swinging around comically until he’s upside down. Gravity working in his favor as it keeps the blade safely far away from his throat.

The square erupts into chaos as the citizens run for their lives. To her dismay, it’s pirates. The soldiers get into action though surprisingly can’t seem to handle half a dozen pirates.

Heavy boards of wood to the head, and other ridiculous means have the soldiers falling over one by one. It’s almost stupid. No blood, no gunshots. She can’t tell if these pirates are hilariously incompetent or actually don’t want to kill anyone.

Neither really make her feel any better as long as she still has a noose around her throat.

One of them makes his way up to her, only to square off with the executioner. She holds her breath as the pirate charges at the far larger man, but he is comically pushed onto his back. The other man _far_ larger than the pirate.

Groaning at the idiocy of her situation, she moves as far forward as the noose will allow and kicks the executioner as hard as she can. He recoils from the pain of her heel and loses his footing at the edge of the platform.

Annoyingly, the pirate thanks her quite graciously. Who was supposed to be rescuing who again?!

A soldier runs up the stairs and starts fighting the pirate near the lever. The good news was, the pirate was just as panicked by the thought of activating the platform as she was, so clearly the young man must have told them to keep her alive.

Though he has far more close calls with the lever than she’d have liked, the pirate manages to knock the soldier from the platform.

She sighs in relief, “thank you.”

He flashes her a semi-toothed grin and… he might even be blushing?? Removing his hat, he goes to take a little bow. “Oh! Your welcome me’lady.”

She opens her mouth to stop him but the words don’t escape in time. His arms stretch out on either side in his little bow and one arm knocks the lever.

The ground vanishes. Gravity takes full control. Carina can’t be sure if she managed to scream or not before she hits something… Oddly, she hits something beneath her, the noose just barely pressing on her throat.

Looking down in shock, she finds the young man under her, holding her up. “You!!”

“Henry!” He corrects with a smile on his face. “Carina. From this moment on, we are to be allies.”

He must have heard her little last testament before swinging down from the clock tower. She tries to shift, more than a little uncomfortable that his hand was on her backside right now. Yes, he was keeping her alive but she’d rather he found a different way to hold her. This was just embarrassing.

“Considering where your left hand is, I’d say we’re _more_ than that.” The boy just continues. “We find the Trident together. Do I have your word?”

She growls softly. This man was clearly dense. He couldn’t seem to take a hint. “You’re holding _everything_ but my word.” He could hold her legs and still accomplish his goal of keeping her elevated enough not to choke. He just wasn’t listening.

“Perhaps we could discuss this later as I’m having trouble hoisting your port.” His voice was a bit strained.

‘Port’?... His hand isn’t on her port… Wait! Does he mean her stern? Wasn’t he supposed to have served on a Navy vessel before arriving here?! What kind of sailor is he?

Now Carina is just annoyed. “You are _far_ from port. That is my stern.” She said quite frankly.

Perhaps a greater irritation, is the look of confusion on the boy’s face as he looks up at her. “Are you sure?”

Again?! Another man who thinks she has no idea what she’s talking about! It’s a ship! There are 4 points of interest. Front, back, left and right. Left and right become port and starboard. Front and back become bow and stern.

Seriously?! What kind of sailor _is_ he?!?!

Her voice comes out in a growl. “ **Positive**!!”

A new voice joins them and her blood runs cold. “Well look at this.” Turning her head confirms her fears. It’s the Lieutenant. “If I kill the coward, the witch hangs. Two for the price of one.” The glint of pure joy in his eyes is terrifying.

“Please don’t let go of me.” She asks Henry. It was more about not being left alone with this terrifying man so eager to see her choke to death. But Henry does have a fair point in his response.

“Might be difficult once he _kills_ me!!” He really isn’t good at controlling his emotions. The fear is more than evident in his voice.

To her relief, the pirate from the shop swings a heavy block of wood, smacking the Lieutenant in the side of the head and knocking him unconscious immediately.

The relief is short-lived as the man declares them his prisoners who will take him to the Trident.

… Great… that’s just great…

They’re taken to a… it’s not a ship. To call it a ship would insult _real_ ships. The _Dying Gull_ is a boat and even _that_ feels like a compliment.

As they are tied to the mast, Carina feels it’s safe to start assuming that Henry has terrible plans.

This was going to be a _very_ long voyage.

After a very laughable casting-off and an un-encouraging declaration of excitement from the crew at finding the little thing did indeed float, they set out to sea.

One of the pirates, a man with Dwarfism surprisingly, found her diary on her thigh and fetched it from her leg.

It was an incredibly obnoxious thing to do and he even had the nerve to look offended when she kicked him for going under her dress.

They wait for what feels like ages as the pirates flip through the diary, attempting to understand its contents and her various notes and calculations. The entire time, Henry tries to get her to tell him what she found out last night. Information she waited _years_ to learn.

His attempts to convince her were minimal at best. Pathetic really.

Despite the fact that he still doesn’t know the difference between port and stern, he does make the fair point that he saved her life back in the square.

So, she tells him only that the blood moon revealed that the map no man can read was hidden in the stars and that it most likely leads to an island. The boy didn’t need to know more than that. Besides, it was the only two certainties she had, if they could even be called that.

After a very annoying and frustrating talk with the pirates, they get her to reveal that the map is hidden in the stars, but nothing more. Worse though, is that they tricked her into it.

It _did_ however, get her diary back and earn them the freedom to move about the sh-... boat. She might as well try to stay honest about her situation after all.

Now though, she’d have to wait for nightfall to start her calculations again.


	7. Growing Cracks

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> ***Now though, she’d have to wait for nightfall to start her calculations again.***  
> (The Silent Mary, somewhere in the Caribbean about two days later)
> 
> This chapter has Spanish again, but most of it is fairly easy to guess from context or isn't so important so much as indicating there is a non-Spanish-speaking person present.

It hadn’t taken them long to find pirate ships to attack. La María seemed to instinctively know where to find them, guiding whoever was at the helm to them like a dog on a trail.

They’d already destroyed several ships and taken about 15 or 20 prisoners.

However, no one on any of those ships had been ill so Miguel didn’t particularly care. When they’d been bringing the pirates aboard, he’d wondered if the Capitán would permit him to expand to physical wounds next.

One of his patients is taking a turn for the worse and two are on their way to being released for execution.

Since they have better and greater access to fresh medical supplies, he could, in theory be better-equipped to study a broken bone or find better ways to keep a gunshot wound from getting infected in their current state.

Being free of their prison offers them greater chance of being free of their curse and all the progress he’s made in his current studies has started to inspire other experiments.

The pirates that had made the mistake of looking at him took on looks of such utter terror in their eyes that he couldn’t help but smile at them.

That, it had seemed, made their terror grow as they were ushered below deck to the brig by Chris and María. She had, at some point, sort of become  _ his _ dog. As the discipline officer, he had been put in charge of the prisoners not under Magda’s care.

The first ship they had come across, they had just crushed under La María’s jaws and fished out survivors from the water. After that though, they started to restrain themselves and attack them more traditionally to actually be able to collect supplies.

Having just attacked a ship, the officers are in the pirate captain’s cabin, examining their finds. Fortunately, as disgusting as these pirates are, they did have a bookkeeper to keep track of their supplies. Apparently they were very specific about theft aboard their own vessel…  _ Hypocrites! _

“ _ God, I  _ **_hate_ ** _ logbooks _ ”, Reyes growls from where he sits in the now dead captain’s chair. Slamming the book shut, he drops it on the desk with a heavy thunk, muttering under his breath. “ _ Where’s Gabriel when you really need him? _ ”

It’s a rhetorical question, but a tense silence overtakes the room. They all know  _ exactly _ where he is, but they all wait, as though  _ daring _ someone else to start that painful conversation.

Miguel can feel several of the eyes in the room on him as he stands there, frozen over a crate of medical supplies he’d been going through.

_ ~...No. This is not the time nor place to discuss him. _

Blinking a few times to clear the fog, he returns to his mental list of the supplies, fishing out a few things to get to the stuff at the bottom.

Steadily, the rhythm of their work resumes as they all return to the logbooks or supplies they’d been going through.

The door soon opens and Lesaro joins them. “ _ Find anything useful? _ ”

Miguel spares him a glance before returning his focus to his box. “ _ One of the men found me more of what I have and a few things I was running out of. Though I am still missing a few items. The doctors these pirates hire are not exactly advanced. We would more likely find my missing supplies on a navy ship. They are better-equipped. _ ”

Lesaro nods. Moss clears his throat. “ _ Bracero asked me earlier if we can hold here a bit. Despite this being a pirate ship, she was built from good materials. With permission, he’d like to take some hands around to gather some parts for The Mary. _ ”

The Lieutenant thinks for a moment. “ _ I will speak to the Capitán about it. He’s eager to get moving. Anything else? _ ”

Cortez clears his throat. “ _ As of now, all the hammocks and blankets in the crew’s quarters have been completely replaced, though some cannot be hung properly with The Mary as she is. _ ”

Lesaro almost looks impressed. “ _ I see. That’s good to hear… I will go speak to Bracero for more on how much he is hoping to take from this wreck. Hearing that a job is done should lighten the Capitán’s mood. In the meantime, assume his answer is ‘no’ and prepare to depart. _ ”

He leaves and the men start gathering everything up to be taken back to La María. Miguel rolls his eyes. Of course the Capitán is still in a bad mood. He hasn’t been able to kill  _ all _ the pirates that have come within his view since the Monarch had sailed into the Triangle.

Repacking the new supplies, he picks up his box and follows the others out the door Reyes is holding open.

He takes them back aboard La María, heading for the hatch below deck.

As he enters the Medical Wing, one of the pirates sits up rapidly and in alarm. He and Manolo stare at him for a long moment.

Sweat coats the pirate’s forehead as he glances between the two ghosts.

After a moment, he turns to Manolo, giving him the box. “ _ Agregue estos artículos al inventario. _ ”

Nodding, Manolo takes the box and gets to work sorting them. Miguel, on the other hand, returns his attention to the pirate. Stalking closer, he can see that he’s trying to hide his arms and legs under the covers more.

Stopping next to the bed, Miguel tips his head. “ _...¿Algo mal?... _ Is something  _ wrong _ , pirate?”

The pirates swallows roughly, but doesn’t speak.

“...Thirsty… perhaps?...”

He still doesn’t answer. Nodding, Miguel gets a clean cup, or at least the cleanest one they have, and fills it, bringing it over and offering it to him.

A bit suspicious, the pirate takes the cup, watching Miguel like a wild animal watching a hunter that just offered it food in the winter.

Miguel straightens up though, hands clasped behind his back, patiently waiting for the man to drink.

When he finally does and leans back to finish it, Miguel leans over and pulls back his bed sheets quickly.

The pirate nearly chokes on his water in his shock, but he doesn’t have a chance to hide it. A small knife with a very thin blade sits by the man’s leg, but close enough that he could still be able to grab it even with his chains.

Picking it up, Miguel examines the rusty and worn-out blade. Glancing at the chains on the pirate’s wrists, he clicks his tongue. There are small scratches in the keyhole of one of them. He had been trying to free himself.

Miguel sits on the empty bed next to his and stares at the pirate. The fear is evident in his eyes as he fights the barely-hidden urge to curl up into a ball to reduce the damage he may take if Miguel were to strike him.

If only he knew… That might be the case with Officer Lopez, or maybe Reyes… but not Magda. No. Not Officer Magda.

His gaze is unbreakable as he examines the pirate closely. He must be feeling better than he’s let on if he’s trying to break out of his chains.

He holds the knife in his hands as he looks the man over. “ _...Manolo?  _ Would you say this patient is recovering well? ”

He hadn’t even looked back over his shoulder, eyes still trained on the pirate. Manolo looks over from the desk though.

“ _ Sí, doctor. _ ”

Miguel nods, then looks down at the knife in his hand. There are a lot of things he could do right now. However, one option in particular was whispering over and over in his ear. The more he attempted to ignore it, the louder and more persistent it got. 

The edges of his vision darkens steadily. The whispers feel like they’re getting closer to his brain as they speak, echoing inside him.

Finally, he looks at the pirate, and that whispering voice almost seems to show him exactly what it would look like. What it would feel like. It seems so real…

The voice got louder inside his head…

He can all but  _ feel  _ the blade sinking into flesh and piercing his bones, snapping them in half…

Miguel blinks hard for a moment, glancing down at the knife in his hands so he can be sure he’s still holding it.

He sits there for what felt like an eternity but truly only amounted to a few seconds. 

…Stabbing the knife into the bedding, the pirate jumps in surprise. At that moment, Miguel reaches over and, with both hands, breaks the pirate’s wrist.

He sits back on the other bed and watches as the pirate screams and writhes, fighting between the instinct to pull his arm to his chest and not moving it at all.

He can feel every set of eyes in the room trained on him… including Manolo…

After a moment of fascinated observation, Miguel blinks. The world feels off and like he has something covering his eyeballs  _ inside _ his eyelids as opposed to over his face. 

_ ~... What just happened?... _

He looks from the screaming pirate to the knife in the mattress. Picking up the knife from the bed, he stands. “ _ Manolo. Ven aquí. _

He can see the fear and hesitation in his apprentice as he approaches the bed.

Once they’re face to face, he motions to the pirate, still screaming on the bed. “ _Arreglarlo._ ”

Confused, and clearly nervous, he watches Manolo walk back to the desk. He takes some things out and starts mixing ingredients in a bowl. Miguel lifts his chin and makes careful note of what goes in.

_ ~...He’s making diethyl ether… Good choice. _

Manolo takes a rag and the bowl over to the man in the bed, returning to grab bandages and some small metal rods before going back again. 

_ ~2 minutes… _

Miguel continues to stand by the bed and watch as Manolo soaks the rag in the mixture and attempts to restrain the flailing pirate long enough to give him the medicine.

Manolo backs off every time the pirate makes a sudden move though.

“ _...Mantén el control, Manolo. _ ”

He can see the younger man take a deep breath before moving in again, adjusting how he held the man’s arm so he couldn’t move it as much before pressing the cloth to his face and holding it there firmly.

_ ~2 minutes… 45 seconds?... _

The man finally starts to go limp on the bed and Manolo pulls the cloth back. 

Miguel goes back to the desk to grab a bucket of water from the floor and a clean rag. Meanwhile, his apprentice goes about setting and binding the wrist with the rods against his skin on both sides to keep it straight, and bandages to hold the rods in place.

As an added measure, Manolo takes some more bandages and uses them to tie the man’s arm to the frame of the bed from up at his elbow.

_ ~5 minutes… Not bad. _

Checking over his work, Manolo stands up and finally looks back at his mentor, nervousness apparent in his features.

Miguel comes over and does a quick look over the bindings and the pirate’s breathing.

Satisfied, he turns to his apprentice with the faintest signs of a smile. “Good work, but you need to stop hesitating. Be more confident in your work. Sometimes you won’t have the time to be uncertain.”

Manolo hangs his head and Miguel taps his shoulder. “Manolo… It is a compliment.” Finally, Miguel pulls the blankets back over the pirate and stands up, motioning to the bucket and clean rag.

“Wash your hands.”

Without another word, he returns to his desk, the knife still in his hand.

Setting the knife in a drawer, he immediately pulls the logbook over from the corner of the desk and opens it to his last page. Taking the ink and quill they’d taken from previous ships, he starts writing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy Valentine's Day! Here's your Spanish translations. Also, please note that I use google translate because I don't speak Spanish. So, if you do and something in my word choices or translations is very wrong, you are free to call me out in the comments. Just be nice about it:
> 
> Agregue estos artículos al inventario.=Add these items to the inventory.  
> ¿Algo mal?=Something wrong?  
> Manolo. Ven aquí.=Come here.  
> Arreglarlo.=Fix it.  
> Mantén el control, Manolo.=Keep control, Manolo.


	8. The Deal and the Sparrow

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> To celebrate my birthday today, look out for another chapter later today! Just need to run it through final edits!!
> 
> I've changed here how to distinguish Spanish that's written in English, Here on, it'll be written as follows: “{words in Spanish}”
> 
> ***Miguel broke his patient’s hand and had Manolo fix it.***  
> (The Silent Mary. Miguel’s POV)

The Capitán eventually calls Officer Magda to his cabin for a report on the patients.

Absently, Miguel wonders if this new level of interest could relate to the number of pirates he has let live as of late... 

Miguel stands in the dim office, light breaking through the dirt and grime of the once gorgeous bay window in odd patterns.

The Capitán leans over his desk, the Lieutenant off to the left of the desk as they examine burnt, musty maps and charts. Some are no doubt vastly outdated by now. Though they are also examining some newer maps they had taken from pirate ships.

Miguel stands behind the Capitán, hands gently clasped behind his back as he stands between the Capitán and the door.

"{I’m afraid one has a broken wrist. But otherwise he would be the closest to dismissal. I caught him attempting to pick the lock on his manacles.}"

"{Hmmm… and how long will it take for his wrist to heal?}"

"{So long as he does not exacerbate it, a few weeks. Two at the earliest if it is not severe and he cooperates.}"

Salazar sighs. The faintest hints of a growl powering it. "{...What about the illness he had when he arrived?}"

"{It is progressing well, so it could be as soon as 3 days. No more than 5 unless something drastic happens to affect his condition.}"

The Capitán’s shoulders steadily drop, his head lifting. "{Then, he has until he is no longer ill. Broken wrist or not, when he is no longer sick, he will face his sentence.}"

For a moment, that voice returns. Miguel’s chin lifts a bit. A soft whisper in the back of his mind. The room is suddenly much smaller and the silence palpable. The musty, damp smell of the room seems stronger. Like a swamp he’d visited once when La María stopped on a small island for fresh water.

Warm and foul and wet. The Capitán’s cabin has never smelled this foul before.

It builds, like a swarm of insects steadily getting closer and surrounding him, but he cannot escape.

He can’t even move.

They speak all as one. Deep, yet somehow high-pitched… He can’t even see anymore…

He wonders… Perhaps… This time-?

A voice breaks the silence. "{Officer Magda? Is everything alright?}"

He blinks. Once. Twice. The voice is gone. The swarm has left his vision. 

Twisting his head to Lesaro, his brow is creased, but his eye is soft.

Straightening, Miguel’s voice is low and even. "{Yes, sir. My apologies.}" He turns to the Capitán, who is now turned to face him. "{I will inform Manolo of your decision, Capitán.}"

——————————

Hours pass and Miguel returns to the top deck. His legs making no sound as he walks up the stairs… They haven’t made any since that day… 

Lesaro is at the helm as they sail over the calm ocean. The Capitán is past his Lieutenant, conversing with Bracero at the rear of the quarterdeck.

Miguel walks over to stand near the helm, eyes shut against the soft sea wind. Except… He frowns...the breeze stings as it hits the cracks in his skin. Yet he does not even feel it against his legs.

He opens his eyes as the Lieutenant speaks up. “Capitán! A ship sails towards us…” He points ahead and there, approaching them, was a pirate ship. Miguel looks around and taps Reyes who is standing nearby.

Miguel holds out his hand and Reyes passes him the spyglass as the Capitán takes the helm, passing his cane to his Lieutenant.

As he looks, his lip curls up. The thing was hideous! Skulls and gaudy gold designs decorate the dark ship with its red sails that look like they were stained with blood a long time ago and the color is fading. It is a disgusting display of everything worth hating about pirates.

Clicking his tongue, he hands the spyglass back to Reyes. Neither men look at one another as La María approaches the doomed vessel. He and Reyes slowly stalk towards the bow, La María picking up speed as she closes in on her target.

There’s a mad glee in every Spanish eye as the Mary lifts her bow from the water, her hull opening in a giant maw eager to sink her timbers into the other ship’s frame like fangs.

She glides over the water, poised like a snake over a bound rat, savoring the moment just before the kill.

Before she drops though, a voice breaks the tension in the air, from a one-legged man on the other ship’s bow.

“Capitán Salazar! I hear ye be lookin’ fer Jack Sparra!”

The Capitán freezes, and the Mary with him. Poised as she is, she hesitates. Like the crew, even La María does not disobey the Capitán’s rules of battle. Do not strike until he orders it.

Salazar looks around at his crew and scowls. Tapping out a rhythm with his foot and sword.

_~Go aboard and wait._

The crew moves like a swarm, dropping down from La María’s jaw to land among the pirates.

One of the pirates foolishly tries to shoot Benetez, but the bullet comically passes through the gaping hole in his face to hit the pirate standing behind him. Miguel allows himself a small chuckle at the terror in their eyes as the ghostly Spaniards surround them.

Miguel stays though, perched on La María’s jaw to gaze down at the unfolding scene below.

Reyes is nearby, looking over the edge like a hawk on a cliff face.

From up here, the pirates look like a colony of overdressed rats in a deep barrel with cats sitting on the lip.

Salazar comes up between his officers. "{Which one spoke?}" He asks as he looks over the edge.

Reyes motions to the man at the bow. "{The arrogant bastard with one leg standing at the bow.}"

Miguel looks at his Capitán, wheezing as he smiles at the officer’s choice of words. He is bent forward and leaning heavily on his sword and cane. Before he can jump, Miguel speaks.

"{Do you want me to hold your cane?}" This looks to be one of his bad days, where he is in more pain than usual. However, if he’s hoping to put on appearances, he may want to leave it here.

Taking a breath, Salazar hesitates. It only lasts a moment though before he jumps down onto the other deck, landing a few steps from the gaudy pirate captain.

Miguel clicks his tongue. Glancing at Reyes who simply shrugs.

Below, the two captains talk for a bit. Salazar seemed to be enjoying it too. The men seem to have a good time killing a few of them. Every time the Capitán taps his sword.

Reyes fidgets every time too. Hands instinctively on the handles of his rifles, wanting nothing more than a reason to draw them.

Closing his eyes, Miguel lets his mind go. It takes a bit of work, but soon he can hear the conversation below. As though standing among them, he can clearly hear the deal the Capitán makes with this hideous pirate, desperate to save his own life in this and be the one man left alive when they finish with his men and this ship.

Finally, after using his sword to order most of the pirates dead, Salazar and the others return to La María with their new prisoners.

Reyes lets out an audible growl to Miguel’s left and he opens his eyes to look at him.

"{Something wrong, Vincent?}"

The gunnery Officer makes a face, though it most likely has nothing to do with Miguel’s informal address.

"{...This is a bad idea. I don’t like the looks of this bastard… Something _will_ go wrong, Miguel! Mark my words. _}"_

He does not disagree with him. He doesn’t like the looks of this pirate either. But, Capitán has given his orders.

As the men are returning, Miguel calls over to Officer Lopez. "{Has anyone searched the Medical Wing?}"

He looks over, "{Capitán says we are only keeping those left on the deck. Sorry, Magda.}"

Miguel doesn’t answer. Rather, he turns back to watch the pirates being hauled aboard. Each one is not dressed properly for sailing. They actually look like filthy versions of the men one might find in a royal court and it makes his lip curl.

At least though, the crew has the joy and satisfaction of getting to tell La María to drop onto the pirate ship.

The looks of horror and despair on the living pirates’ faces was worth whatever they could have taken from the vessel.

As the pirate recovers from the shock of his ship sinking, one of the men walks over to him and Reyes, soon going below with the gunnery Officer.

Miguel watches as Officer Lopez brings other pirates up from the brig to clean the upper deck. He eyes each of them carefully. Searching for the slightest sign of weakness. A limp. A cough. A wound… _Something!_

… 

He clicks his tongue…

———————————

Hours tick by and Miguel comes back up from visiting his patients to check on things.

The pirates were scrubbing, rather pointlessly, at the blood and powder stains of La María’s deck. Spotting Bracero, Miguel walks over to where he is carving something with a knife.

“Bracero.”

He looks up from his project for a moment and returns to his work with a small smirk. “Officer Magda. How are the… patients?...”

Miguel takes a little longer to blink before answering him. “Recovering. In a few days one or two should be clear to leave my care… Then, I imagine, the Capitán will offer them to the crew.”

Bracero chuckles, “excellent. My blades are growing stale. These carvings are the only thing that seems to sate them.”

Miguel smirks, glances to the quarterdeck. “...Have you heard anything?... Seen anything?”

Following the Medical Officer’s gaze, he turns back to answer. "{He keeps consulting a compass. That’s all I can say for certain.}"

He nods.

A compass? But what good can a compass do him? Unless he happened to know where Jack was going before they had approached him… Though even that seems far-fetched…

Miguel walks up to join the other officers on the quarterdeck as the pirate continues to steer, gaze locked on the dark horizon.

For his sake, he should hope Jack is within catching distance, or else one of the men will be cleaning his blood of the helm.

As the hours ticked by, María came up on deck with Officer Lopez for some exercise. She pauses only to growl at the pirates who stopped working for too long.

Miguel could swear the dog makes eye contact with him just before she wags her tail, but he can’t be sure. He does _not_ understand why she likes him.

Fortunately, someone else comes up from below deck to visit them. Miguel allows himself a smile as Moss comes up from below deck, but it’s not directed at Moss. Rather, at the cat on his shoulders.

By how comfortably he walks with the massive cat on his shoulders, you would think Moss isn’t even aware of its presence.

Not unlike the dog, the cat came aboard in the Triangle. Except, he’d come aboard on a pirate ship. The only reason _he_ was allowed aboard was because Moss found him trying to rip the pirate captain’s throat open.

Also, and this was a point of amusement among the crew, it’s long, black, white and silver fur reminded everyone of their Capitán.

Many among the crew had started calling it ‘Capitán Gato’ behind Salazar’s back. Though no one dared to be foolish enough to say it in front of him.

Since Moss had found him, the cat had grown incredibly attached to the Officer.

Moss walks the cat to the quarterdeck where it hops off, landing on the railing that Salazar is leaning on. The Capitán stops his penetrating gaze on the horizon to stare down at the massive furball.

It is hardly an over-fed animal. It is just a very large breed with very long fur that’s popular among pirates.

Salazar is still for a moment before he lifts a hand to pet the cat, who instantly leans in to the touch, purring loudly.

There’s something in that sound that lulls Miguel’s eyes to close.

His whole body softens in a way it hasn’t in a long time.

He doesn’t open his eyes until the furball comes his way, sitting by where his legs would be and meowing at him.

The cat stares at where his feet should be, then up at Miguel. Tail swishing on the deck, Miguel knows the look in his eyes well. He holds an arm down, palm facing up and brings his other arm around at a higher point.

Bracing, the cat jumps. Front paws hit his hand and he holds still as it pushes itself up higher into his other hand. This sets the large, roughly 15 or 17 pound cat in his arms.

Evidently though, that’s not what he wanted as he shifts around until the giant cat is seated on Miguel’s shoulders, it’s legs easily reaching both of them.

_~3 feet. He must be about 3 feet by now._

It’s now that Miguel makes eye-contact with the pirate at the helm, who’d apparently been watching them.

The pirate doesn’t look away though. Not until the cat hisses at him, baring its sharp teeth.

Reaching up a cracked hand, Miguel once again closes his eyes as soft fur rubs against it. He bites the inside of his lip. Did he forget how soft cats are? Or has it been so long and has his skin been so damaged that it makes the fur more luxurious now?...

———————————

Eventually, the cat leaves his shoulder to wander the deck, settling in Bracero’s lap.

Further down the deck, he spots Reyes coming up from below deck. For a moment, he wants to ask him something, but the harder and harder he attempts to figure out what, the further it slips from his grasp.

There’s a haze… something he wants Reyes… to do?... Say?...

No. It is escaping him.

It is night now. Most of the pirates already taken back below deck to the brig. Only the pirate captain, Barbossa, as Lesaro told him his name, remained on deck with them.

Bracero was correct, the man _is_ consulting a compass for his course. But why??

… There are too many potential reasons and not one seems sturdy enough to support the behavior he witnesses from the pirate. He truly would have to know Sparrow’s exact course and the capacity of his ship if a compass is enough...

However, the pirate proves to be more clever than he lets on. As the sun peeks over the horizon, he manages to buy time by getting Salazar to tell the tale of how they came to be here today.

Miguel almost speaks. Almost chooses to reveal the ploy to his Capitán. But he doesn’t… There is something in his Capitán’s voice… he _needs_ this.

While he knows Salazar never will let go of Sparrow’s life or his desire to destroy it, that doesn’t mean this won’t help. That his pain won’t be eased in some way.

As Salazar finishes his tale, he moves behind the pirate, sword raised to run straight through his throat. With their current strength from being cursed, perhaps he’d even cut clean through the spine without any resistance.

Just before he strikes though, the pirate speaks up, voice suddenly light… He doesn’t hide the relief in his voice very well. “Not yet, Capitán! _Look!_ Found as promised…”

Miguel lifts his chin, squinting against the sunlight. A very small vessel was visible on the edge of the horizon.

Even with La María’s speed, it would take a few hours to catch them.

If it turns out _not_ to be Sparrow’s boat though…

Well... Miguel wonders if there will be anything recognizable left of Barbossa when Salazar finishes with him…

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If anyone cares, it may come up later, but Vincent Reyes is my OC and his first name has a non-Spanish spelling for a reason. ;D
> 
> Also, the kitty does have a name & it'll come up later on. If anyone doesn't recognize the description, it's a Maine Coon. Gorgeous fluffballs! Maria (the dog) is a wolf-like breed called the Utonagan. This isn't necessarily for historical accuracy and more about giving you a chance to look up pictures so you have a mental image every time these fluffbabies come up in this story from here-on out ;)
> 
> Special thanks of course to piratesangel on Tumblr. Also, thanks to Senneres and her fic "Bella Muerte" as it greatly inspired this fic and some of the headcanons for different characters


	9. Stars and Frustration

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> (The Dying Gull. Carina’s POV. 3rd night at sea after leaving St. Martin. Starts at night time of last chapter. So after Barbossa takes the helm of the Silent Mary, but before Salazar tells his story)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Meant to post this yesterday. Sorry everyone. I spent all day stewing in anxiety over a presentation and then was busy with friends in the evening trying to feel better. So, again, sorry. Meant to do this yesterday, but, *enjoy*!
> 
> Also, we're getting close to what you've all been waiting for! They will finally be meeting next chapter! :D

The sun once again sets on the horizon. It’s the third time now since leaving Saint Martin.

The pirates had become no more tolerable following their departure. Carina is still frustrated about how Jack got her to even tell them the map was in the stars.

She had to admit though, it was impressive that he managed to get what he wanted from her without really expending the energy necessary to kill someone… Not that she’d ever tell him that though.  _ Never! _

It becomes a point of concern actually. Is Jack a cunning man who is not to be underestimated? Or a drunken fool of a pirate who you have to talk to in small words only?

Frustratingly, the more she sees of his behavior, the less-certain she becomes. The crew weren’t exactly what she had been expecting of pirates. They seemed almost deserving of pity compared to the sort she and many others had been raised to fear.

It’s hard to get her work done though when it’s best done at night and the pirates keep bugging her during the day time to give them a heading every hour or so.

Thankfully, they did have some food aboard, though she didn’t quite trust the meat. None of these men seem like capable cooks so she had been sticking with the bread and few pieces of fruit they offered her at mealtimes.

———————————

A few hours into her work and she can feel herself blinking more often. It’s not quite that she feels tired. More like her eyes and brain are sore.

Movement out the corner of her eye catches her attention and she glances over to see Henry looking out behind them with his spyglass. Jack is drunk and asleep on a pile of ropes with what she thinks is a spare sail next to him.

Gibbs, as she’d learned his name was, is on the helm. He seems to be the nicest and among the more intelligent of the bunch, if incredibly superstitious. But he’d at least made attempts to be hospitable. The others had just watched her like cornered cats.

She could hear Henry and Jack talking, but not what about. The sounds of the sea against the hull, wind in the sails and muffled speech all blur together as she concentrates on her diary.

Every now and then, she’d look up at the sky, then back down in frustration. These pirates have  _ no _ navigational tools for her to work with. Not even so much as a compass on this whole damn boat.

The idea that these pirates ever get where they want to go seems like a miracle in her mind without maps, charts, instruments or even a compass to guide them. Yet they were incredibly confused at the idea of sailing by the stars. How do they  _ ever _ get where they’re going?

She shakes her head. Now is not the time to get frustrated with them. It won’t do her any good. Besides, she at least has her chronometer. Sadly, the constantly-changing location and the lack of cooperation from the pirates means she has to constantly change her numbers just to figure out their speed and where they currently are. It’ll take her forever to find the island at this rate.

They’ll probably get sick of waiting long before that and throw her and Henry overboard for real.

What makes it worse, and that fate more likely, is that she’s hitting a dead end. Pursing her lips, she closes her diary, staring hard at the cover.

Henry moves closer and she watches him for a bit. He’s well-within audible range for a chat. Perhaps a distraction will clear the fog around whatever she’s missing.

“...Looking for ghosts, Henry?”

He turns to her rather quickly, as though he hadn’t realized he’d moved so close to her.

His face is calm, but rather serious as he looks at her. “The dead  are _coming_ , Carina.”

She doesn’t bother to hide her eye roll. “Right, and I’m sure they’re bringing an army of sirens to eat our faces too. Ghosts aren’t real, Henry.”

For how little he seems to know about ships, he’s certainly superstitious enough to be a sailor.

Henry finally closes his spyglass and turns to her. “Have you ever seen one?” She narrows her eyes and tips her head at him. The boy really is mad. “Of course not. They aren’t real, so it’s impossible to see one.”

His confident smirk is irritating. “Have you ever seen a one-legged man?”

...Has he been drinking seawater? That’s the most random, bizarre question she’s ever been asked. “Wha-no! What-What does that have to do with anything?!”

“Simple. You haven’t seen it, but they do exist. So, just because you haven’t seen a ghost, doesn’t mean they can’t also be real.”

Henry looked incredibly confident in his logic.

Unamused, she steps forward. “Men have 2 legs and are very prevalent. It has been seen and proven that humans can survive without an arm or leg. Therefore, it’s perfectly logical. Ghosts, however, require a human to be able to speak, move and interact with the world without a heartbeat. Tell me, have you ever seen a human without a heartbeat do any of those things?”

This makes Henry pause and she grins triumphantly. “You should consider putting old sea tales to bed. They’re full of mistaken visions brought on by thrust, hunger, drunkenness and fear.”

Without waiting for a response, she turns to walk back to the bow. “I suggest you get some rest, Henry.” She calls over her shoulder.

After some minutes, Henry leaves to go find a place to rest on the tiny vessel.

Alone on the deck with only Gibbs, who was trying to converse with Jack, she turns her attention back to her diary.

Her eyes land on the crimson jewel that almost seemed to glow faintly in the moonlight. Recalling the strange effect of the ruby from back in Saint Martin, she looks at it more closely.

Taking it from its place on the cover, she turns it over in her hand. In certain spots, she could swear there were strange lines in it. Lifting the jewel up to the sky for some better light, she gasps softly.

The line turned out to connect the stars, though not very precisely. Curious, she reopens her book and tries to match her calculations from earlier. As she moves the jewel slowly across the sky, she freezes. It wasn’t just connecting stars, but constellations.

Curious, she starts trying to locate the shapes without the jewel.

She tries to mark the angle of each line in the jewel to maybe calculate the next constellations in the day time.

_ ~Let’s see… if this means… oh! Then perhaps this phrase in the diary could mean… Oh! Orion?! _

Based on notes in the diary, she picks out Bellatrix, the star in Orion’s left shoulder. If she’s interpreted it correctly, and translated the diary properly, since it’s in Italian, that should be the starting point on the map.

_ ~Now, which way from Bellatrix does the map intend to go?... _

Looking back at the sky, she picks out Pisces and looks through the jewel again.

_ ~Hmmm… that doesn’t align with any of Pisces’ stars that can match another further down the path… _

She spent a long time searching, but finally found the line to match perfectly with Ruchbah in Cassiopeia's hand.

_ ~So, Orion the hunter and son of Poseidon, then to Cassiopeia the queen… where next though? _

There are too many clouds to pick out the next constellation, so she switches to her memory of them and tries to recall all the ones in that area.

As she makes her list, the sun starts to peek over the horizon and she yawns. Her eyes sting from the effort it’s taken to keep them open. When was the last time she slept? Probably too long ago.

The crew begins to stir and she only pulls away to grab a piece of bread that the crew is setting out for breakfast.

As soon as she finishes eating it, she curls up at the bow to catch a little sleep before returning to work.

Sadly, as soon as they finish eating, the pirates start bugging Henry about bugging her again. She must have been very tired because she drifts off to sleep even in spite of the noise they make.

She finally gets a lead and the pirates are demanding the entirety of the map. Not that she would tell them she’s made  _ any _ progress at all.

As long as they need her, she’s safe. It’s knowledge in her head they need so her cooperation is essential. Therefore, the less she reveals, the more leverage she has to stay safe and fed.

Hours tick by until about mid-morning and their constant bothering makes it impossible to sleep anymore.

This isn’t unfamiliar territory though. She’s had many sleepless nights before.

In the end, it’s not nearly enough sleep as Henry is soon shaking her awake. They’d given her only 3 hours of sleep, according to him and they were demanding more answers and a heading.

Without the stars though, she’ll have to recalculate their longitude and compare it to her best estimate of Cassiopeia’s position to give them one. That’ll take at least 30 minutes with all their bugging.

Sure enough, they bother her relentlessly as she attempts to work and she finally has enough as they continue to speak as though she’s deaf  _ and _ continue to assume that astronomy means she breeds  **_donkeys_ ** of all things!

She tries, once again, to explain what she is doing. “This chronometer keeps the exact time in London. With it, I can calculate our position to determine longitude. Then I’ll know our exact spot at sea and I can give you a heading. Now, if you’ll let me work, my calculations are precise and true and I can _give_ _you_ a heading. After all, I’m not just an astronomer, I’m also a horologist.”

There’s a silence around the deck and Jack seems oddly attempting to comfort her as though he misheard her for something else. After a brief exchange with the idiots it becomes clear they think she meant a prostitute.

“Horology, is the study of time!” She quickly attempts to correct the error but that somehow doesn’t seem to work, only further their belief in it. God! Pirates are so incredibly  _ stupid! _

For better or worse, one of the pirates breaks the monotony. “ **Ship to the aft!!** ”

All heads and eyes turn to the ship that had appeared behind them. Storm clouds looming over it. As she watches, Carina calculates that they are gaining steadily and will be on top of them within hours… No. Less?!? An hour. 2 tops. She’s not had much experience with ships but it seems to be moving awful fast.

By this distance, it must be a large ship to even be so big this far out.

The crew starts panicking as Henry claims it to be the ship full of ghosts.

_~Good lord. He is_ **never** _going to let this thing go._

Swords are soon drawn as the crew had apparently  _ not _ been told of the ghosts as many times as she had.

Well… this could get ugly...


	10. Close calls and Close Encounters

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> ***The Silent Mary has spotted the Dying Gull and is closing in fast. The pirates have all turned on Jack but Carina is making progress on the map***
> 
> (Magda’s POV)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> God! Magda will *not* leave me alone! Chapter 11 is in review and he's made me start Chapter 12 too... Then again, this is where things start to get fun ;)
> 
> Maybe won't be the meeting you're all waiting for, but I count it as their first, unofficial meeting. Enjoy!

Feet pound on the old, damaged wood of La María as her crew prepares for battle. Barbossa taken below some time ago.

Magda floats through the sea of madness. Alternating between pauses and swift but certain steps over the stained, but once beautiful wood, he makes his way to the bow as though in a strange dance with the grand ship.

He finally reaches the bow, taking a spyglass offered by Reyes as he passes him and moves to get a look at the ship in the distance.

… Evidently, not as distant as he’d thought. The vessel in his sights could hardly be called a ‘ship’. A tiny little thing! La María could simply run it down. She won’t even need to open her jaws.

_~...Wait… Have they changed course?_

Taking a mental measurement, at least as best he can with no instruments handy, he thinks the ship has indeed veered off… There don’t appear to be much as far as apparent reasons visible unless they simply don’t want to go to the island ahead…

As he goes to lower the spyglass, he pauses then readjusts…

The corners of his lips turn up slightly. It couldn’t be…

There’s a sound behind him, getting closer, but it’s lost in the roar of activity.

“{...Officer Magda? Is it Jack?...}”

Lowering the spyglass, he turns to his Capitán. “{I believe it is sir. However, he is not on the pitiful excuse for a ship… he appears to be on a longboat headed for shore.}”

Hunched over his cane and sword, his eyebrows knit together. Stepping up to stand next to his Officer, he moves as though to take the spyglass but Magda holds his hand on his sword hilt.

The pain had clearly increased since yesterday.

“{If I may…}”

He angles the spyglass towards the island and offers it to his Capitán to look through.

“{...Lower, Magda…}”

He lowers the angle of the spyglass some, and he can hear the change in his Capitán’s breathing. Jack does indeed appear to be in the longboat, along with the boy from that English ship that Salazar had told to deliver a message to Jack about 2 or 3 weeks ago.

Strangest though was the woman in the boat with them. She appeared to be reasonably dressed. Nothing especially fancy about her clothes though. Miguel was still running ideas about what she could be doing with them.

Finally, Salazar turns from the spyglass and locates Lesaro on the deck. Miguel only watches for a moment, before returning to the spyglass.

To his shock, the woman appeared to be removing her dress. Distantly, he heard Lesaro shout about something to be dropped, but he alternated between the spyglass and simply looking without it… It appeared what he was seeing was really happening.

She has a nice figure. Healthy from what he can tell at this distance…

He feels his lips curve down in a frown when she doesn’t get any more undressed than taking her dress off before she jumps off the boat and starts to swim to shore, still somewhat covered.

_~...Ahhh… the Señorita is not a fool…_

Regardless of how much she knows about what is happening, she is apparently intelligent enough to know not to stay too close to Jack and that her dress won’t allow her to get to shore without the boat.

She has chosen her life over her modesty… While nothing he would vocally encourage, it is indeed the smart choice here.

He finally turns away from the bow to return Reyes’s spyglass. He finds the young officer inspecting his rifles.

They actually looked far better than when they had first been trapped in the Triangle. He’s spent the past few years collecting parts and supplies for maintaining weapons to restore his prized rifles to usable condition. They certainly _look_ to be.

“{Will you be joining us Vincent? Or has the Capitán ordered you to stay behind again?}”

He pauses his inspection and his lip curls. All but one of his guns is out of its holster and he growls lowly. “{Once again I am being forced to wait _away_ from the action! Capitán does not trust me not to take his moment from him. Refuses to let Sparrow die by gunshot. Wants to drag it out with a blade no doubt… If he let me though, we could be _finished_ and headed _home_!}”

Miguel holds out the spyglass to him, which Reyes tucks away next to the still-holstered pistol on his chest.

Everyone had to maintain an immaculate appearance when they were alive, but Salazar made an exception to his uniform rules for the gunnery officer’s small collection of rifles.

The men had only seen him draw the one in front once… Reyes has never been more terrifying than on that day…

Sensing movement around him, Miguel looks up to see the crew moving to the bow with the Capitán.

“{I will be back, friend. Try not to shoot any fish. They don’t deserve your anger.}” With that, he turns to join the others.

Minutes later, they are charging over the water, as they had so many times before in the Triangle. This time though, all eyes were trained on one body. One life. One man… Jack.

In spite of the sharks and the overwhelming numbers, Jack still makes it to shore.

They gather at the edge of the water line. All eyes focused on Jack. For a moment, he couldn’t see anything else… His mate’s were all around him. But he could only see Jack.

Something nags at him though…

Whatever it is, it’s _very_ irritating.

It becomes more persistent though. Something happens off to his right… A voice?... A woman’s voice?... Is there a woman here?...

Blinking, he looks around and his gaze settles on the woman from the boat, still incredibly underdressed. There’s a look of pure terror in her eyes and Miguel realizes… he doesn’t remember approaching the shore… or stopping… or that anyone else was here…

His vision even seems brighter than a moment ago… as though his sight had been reduced to the size of a gun barrel and was entirely trained on Jack until she’d screamed...

Looking around, he realizes that the boy is also still alive and is staring at them with the same fear as the last time they’d seen him.

Jack has aged, but that’s no surprise… From one look, it’s obvious he’s spent a lot of time at sea and his skin is suffering for it.

His non-existent breath catches in his throat as one of the men moves forward without a look at the water line and crumbles to dust.

He wasn’t paying attention! Are any of them?! A glance around the group confirms it. Perhaps they’re all in that state he was but a moment ago? They are all hyper-focused on Jack as he laughs at their dead comrades.

Why isn’t Salazar more angry? He looks almost happy at just being able to _see_ Jack. More of the men fall around him because of Jack and he does not even respond??

To his horror, Moss steps forward quickly, as though he too will not stop at the water line. He quickly grabs the younger officer’s arm and pulls him back. He stares at Miguel’s arm but doesn’t make other moves to go forward.

Miguel doesn’t stop to watch Moss figure it out as the woman screams again and runs off into the forest. Softly, he clicks his tongue.

Jack says something strange as the boy runs after her shouting “Carina?!”

_~...Is that her name?..._

Jack is oddly polite as he ends his conversation. Pointing back where the two had run off. “I’d love to stay and chat, but me map’s just run away.”

_~His map??... Ohhhh… So what Barbossa said may be true. Jack’s hoping the legend of the Trident is real & that it will save him. If that’s the case, then either the boy or that woman has the map… _

Magda’s eyes narrow and Salazar taunts the pirate one last time, gleefully enjoying the look of haunted terror behind Jack’s smile as he backs away towards the jungle.

The walk back to the Mary was longer than earlier. But Miguel’s mind is preoccupied.

_~When he met us, was the boy afraid we would kill him? Or afraid we might find this supposed map? Or was it both?  
Or was it both?... No… no the map is said to be one no man can read. The way the boy had attempted to row that longboat suggests he barely knows anything about sailing, nevermind map-reading… Wait… _

He recalls how it was she’d gotten to shore before Jack and a thought occurs to him.

_~Could it really be that simple? Like some cosmic trick?..._

Could it be that the legendary map was somehow designed so that only a woman could decipher it?... Seems unlikely. Men and women are both equally capable of great stupidity as well as intelligence…

But… that does not discount this woman as being the ‘map’ Jack referred to. Of his brief observations of the three, she actually seemed the most intelligent and therefore the most likely to have even _heard_ the story.

The more he thinks about it, the more it seems likely. He doesn’t have enough to really prove it, but he can _feel_ it.

_~...Hmmm… If Jack needs his map to save his life from the Capitán… then perhaps…_

The corners of his lips turn up in a smile as he climbs back up onto the Mary. He moves absently over the deck. A whistle catches his attention.

Bracero and Reyes watch him from the other side of the deck. With a pause, he walks over to them. “{Gentlemen?}”

Bracero arches an eyebrow. “{Capitán does not look happy… Is Sparrow still alive?}”

He sighs. “{Unfortunately. Yes}”

Reyes stares at him, eyes narrowed. “{...Hmmm… He’s going to be angry about that…}”

——————————

A few hours tick by. It’s roughly mid-afternoon when even the Lieutenant cannot calm the Capitán anymore.

At his orders, Miguel and several other officers head below deck with keys. 

_~Knowing Salazar, this is going to be messy…_

——————————

Not an hour later, all the pirates from Barbossa’s crew, the patient with the broken wrist and one or two others for good measure, are up on deck and tied upside down, hung from the main mast by their ankles.

There’s maybe… 22 pirates… 18 from Barbossa’s crew. It’s getting closer to evening now. Maybe an hour or 2 until sunset.

Salazar starts going down the line, stabbing each pirate with his rapier and claiming their deaths to be in the name of their king.

Miguel closes his eyes. It was honestly just best to let him unleash his full anger on them.

Quickly, Barbossa starts trying to reason with him, begging they be spared since he kept his end of their original bargain.

This pirate clearly likes to flirt with death to attempt to get another deal and _more_ mercy from _El Matador del Mar_.

Eventually though, Miguel is sighing as Salazar cuts the pirate captain free. But at least the men can laugh a little at how he is unceremoniously dropped on his head in the process.

Grudgingly, the pirates are given their weapons back and walked to shore. As they are going, the officers gather around the Capitán to watch and voice their opinions.

For the most part, it’s fairly unanimous… Salazar should’ve just killed him.

“{Your opinions are noted, but you are _not_ offering more _helpful_ alternatives.}” Salazar growls.

Magda turns his gaze back to the island.

“{...Actually Capitán… I _may_ have an alternative…}”

All eyes turn to him, most of them surprised.

Salazar’s grip tightens on the hilt of his sword. “{Then speak Officer. _Quickly_.}”


	11. Out of the Pan & Into the Fryer

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> ***Salazar’s grip tightens on the hilt of his sword. “{Then speak Officer. Quickly.}***
> 
> (This chapter will switch between POV’s but will be marked. Magda’s first)

“{You are  _ certain _ of this, Magda?}” There is a tense threat looming in the air over the Capitán’s question.

He doesn’t dare show any weakness now. He must stand by his plan.

He meets Salazar’s eyes dead on. “{Based on what I have observed, I am certain that Barbossa is unreliable, and that the lady is far too intelligent to be sailing with a pirate out of genuine interest for him.}”

Some of the officers raise eyebrows at him but he doesn’t stop.

“{She was intelligent enough to abandon the long boat before the boy was and does not seem like the sort pirates might hold hostage for coin. Jack also said his map had run away back on the beach. The only others there were her and the boy. If it turns out not to be her, then the boy will have a reason to come to us regardless and he will offer you Jack’s life in exchange for hers.}”

He pauses to let them take it in. Lesaro is the first to speak. “{What makes you so certain that if the boy has the map, he will still come to save her without obtaining the Trident first?}”

Miguel arches an eyebrow, curling one side of his mouth up in a small smirk.

“{She took her dress off in front of him in order to swim to safety. By what I could see of his face, he has  _ never _ seen so much as a woman’s ankles before. He has a hint to what is beneath her dress, so he will try to save her Lieutenant. He will save her, if for no other reason than in the hopes it will get him into her bed.}”

Lopez, Reyes  _ and  _ Cortez are chuckling as the Lieutenant’s eye goes wide at his meaning. Salazar cracks a small grin at his implication.

He seems to contemplate for a moment, then nods. “{Very well Magda. However, if  _ anything _ goes wrong, you will be taking  _ full _ responsibility.}  Entender ?”

Magda’s lips curl up in a smile and he gives his commanding officer a small bow. “ Sí, Capitán. Entiendo. ”

——————————

**(Carina’s POV-After leaving the beach)**

~ _ This  _ can’t _ be happening! This  _ can’t _ be happening!! _

Ghosts  _ aren’t _ real! They  _ can’t  _ be! Everything she’s ever seen and read and learned have demonstrated that ghosts are simply  _ not _ possible!!

...And yet…

There they’d been… men with pieces missing. Some had massive holes in their chests! And they  _ walked _ over the  _ water _ ! That’s bordering on religious nonsense!

They were moving. They moved over water and dissolved on land… It’s  _ not _ possible. It just  _ can’t _ be!!

Her lungs burn as she races through the jungle, ignoring the stabbing pain of the broken wood or sharp rocks she steps on. She simply doesn’t care right now.

She pauses as her foot hits a rock and she stumbles into a tree. She spares her foot only a glance. It’s not cut. Not bleeding. Just bruised and in a lot of pain.

She opts to ignore it and push on. She’s not sure where she’s going. Maybe she’ll just find someplace to curl up in a ball and shake. Try to work out what she saw. What had happened.

Suddenly, the ground is gone from beneath her.

_ ~What the-?!... A NET?! _

No! No. NoNononononono!

She can’t! She just  _ can’t _ deal with any more today!

Unsure of what sort of person would set this sort of trap, she starts screaming for help.

Jack and Henry show up, but they are caught too.

——————————

Well… This company is  _ marginally  _ better than the pirate crew. At least there are some women here so it’s a  _ little _ less uncomfortable than on the  _ Dying Gull _ …

...But only a little bit.

After they’d knocked out Jack, they’d all been taken to a small village where she’d been given a new dress, thankfully. Although it was actually a little big for her. 

_ ~At least it stays on. _

She only wishes she’d had a little more privacy when putting it on.

But as soon as she was dressed, they were tying her hands together and dragging her along with Henry to what appeared to be a whale skeleton. The bones seemed whiter than they should’ve been but she isn’t given much time to really take it in as she’s pushed into a seat next to Henry.

Looking around, there’s rows of people almost like… pews in a Church?

Now that she has a chance to look around, the man up at the front seems to be a priest, and the on their man there seems to be wearing a suit of sorts…

What is this? A church service? Why is it under whale bones??

Jack is brought out by two men. He seems to still be unconscious as they hold him at the front. His hands are tied behind him and they take a noose hanging from the whale skeleton’s spine to wrap around his neck. It’s low enough not to kill him, but it’ll keep him from going anywhere.

They wake him up and the man next to the priest reveals that Jack owes him money and wants him to pay him back by marrying his sister. Admittedly, she is not the most beautiful woman and she  _ clearly  _ doesn’t take good care of herself.

She and Henry are apparently the best man and the bridesmaid, but as Jack refuses to agree to the union, guns are held to their heads. She and Henry try to get Jack to just agree but he’s  _ very  _ stubbornly against it. So, the pair switch to trying to figure a way for him to get out of it.

Unfortunately, Jack ends up saying ‘I do’ and the woman goes to kiss him.

Before they can kiss though, a gunshot rings out and it makes Carina’s heart jump into her throat.

A one-legged pirate with one of those enormous powdered wigs and an elaborately-decorated coat approaches.

Apparently Jack knows him and, although he saves them from this  _ awful _ wedding, he ends up taking the three of them hostage.

No… No this is too much…

Lack of sleep or real food. Irritating pirates. A mutiny. Having to ditch her dress and deal with Jack’s disgusting looks and comments as she did so, to having  _ everything  _ she believes in thrown into question by  _ ghosts!! _ Running for her life! Kidnapped! Guns pointed at her head! And now  _ more pirates!! _

No?! Apparently that’s  _ not _ the end of it?? Now they’re trying to get a ship to sail off the island with, out of a tiny glass bottle?! And it’s  _ working?!?! _

...No… 

No, she can  _ not _ be expected to just go along with this quietly! She’s reached her limit!

As the pirates watch the ship stall at about the size of a toy, she slowly backs up and, as they are all staring at it, she bunches up some of the dress in her hands and runs for it.

It’s harder than she thought, running with her hands tied in front of her in a dress that’s too big. Fortunately, the distraction helped her get a good lead.

It also helps that these pirates aren’t very fast on their feet.

Panic builds in her chest as Henry calls after her, alerting the pirates to her escape. Why can’t he just keep his mouth shut so she can get away??

Her feet scream in protest as she runs from the pirates. She moves along the cliff face, taking her steps quickly but carefully, hoping and begging whatever force of nature could hear her that she wouldn’t slip and fall here.

The pirates scream for her to stop from somewhere behind her. By the sounds of things, they were starting to gain on her. The panic rises, creating a pounding in her head and making her throat feel smaller than usual.

Out of nowhere, she hears the sound of a gunshot and everything goes black for a moment.

——————————

**(Officer Reyes’s POV)**

He and a few of the men were walking along on the water, far away from the shoreline but close enough to see people on the beaches.

Hernandez runs over to him.

“{Sir. Barbossa and the pirates seem to have found a ship somewhere. They appear to be making ready to sail!}”

His lip curls up into a scowl and he growls softly. They were right not to trust him…

Hernandez starts leading them back around to that side of the island. If they hurry, perhaps they can kidnap Jack and bring him back to La María.

As they are walking, the rest of their group join them. Movement catches his eye though. Something big and orange moving along the cliff face.

He freezes, mouth dropping open in disbelief.

The woman Magda had described seems to be attempting to run from the pirates, though she is running rather awkwardly.

The other men stop and follow his gaze, equally startled.

The pirates are gaining on her. They’ll catch her in a few minutes. Blinking himself out of his shock, he starts moving closer. “{With me, men! I have a plan.}”

They stick close as he moves closer to the cliffs. He halts the men several feet from being under it and watches the path ahead of her.

“{Stand back but be ready to move in!}”

The bottom of the cliff was some 25 feet above the water line… But there is a large, supporting rock sticking out of the cliff face maybe 14 feet up. Less than 10 with his height factored in.

_ ~Isabel should do the trick… _

Drawing the newly-restored pistol from his hip, he points her to the smaller rocks at the base of the supporting one.

He freezes.

_ ~Not yet… not yet… almost… 5… 4… 3… 2… 1… NOW! _

He squeezes the trigger hard. Warmth fills his soul as the long-lost sound of his pistol fills the air around them. A small puff of smoke rising from the fuse. His eyes drift shut as he breathes it in. A small smile spreads across his face.

Moments later, a scream breaks the air and his eyes snap open.

As he’d hoped, the rocks had broken away from the cliff face, taking her footing with it and the Señorita is now falling. The rocks, much heavier than her, will hit the water first.

His left arm shoots out to stop Hernandez from rushing in to catch her. He won’t be able to do so without getting hit by the rocks. He will turn to dust.

Just before she hits the water, he lets the men go to retrieve her, turning his attention to Isabel in his hands…

She had fired…  _ Successfully! _

He had not felt this peaceful since before the Triangle. Pulling out a clean cloth he’d acquired over the years, he cleans her barrel and casually strolls over to the gasping Señorita, reloading Isabel on the way.

——————————

**(Carina’s POV)**

She recovers quickly, noticing the ground was no longer beneath her and the cliff getting farther away.

_ ~...Wait… I-I  _ fell _?! _

The panic from earlier returns and she screams as she plummets towards the cold, unforgiving water.

_ ~How did I fall?? …The pirates shot at me. Did my foot slip when I blacked out? _

Before she can think through it, she’s hitting the water. The salt stings her feet but she manages to take a breath in time.

Her dress rapidly starts to feel heavy, but, to her surprise, her head had just barely dipped below the water before she was being pulled back up.

Coughing and gasping against the cold and her stinging feet, she tries to get loose from the hands holding her.

There’s an odd smell too… like charred meat or ash and something rotten… WAIT!

Her eyes find who’s holding her and she immediately tries to get free.

The ghosts are back, and they’re staring at her.

_ ~How did-? Where did they-?? _

Soft, almost imperceptible splashes sound over the water and she turns to the sound of scraping metal to find another ghost walking towards them. Except he has a pistol in his hands that he appears to be reloading… Wait a second…

“Y-you?!  _ You _ tried to shoot me?!” She inwardly curses her voice for shaking.

His head snaps up, almost as though shocked to hear her speak. “Que? Shoot you?!”

His gaze hardens. “No, Señorita. I can assure you, if I had been trying to shoot  _ you _ , you would have a bullet wound in need of treatment.”

Her eyes widen at his intense glare. It almost seemed like his eyes had a literal fire in them.

Not wanting to meet his gaze, she tries to look at her feet. Problem is, she doesn’t succeed. She stops at  _ his _ feet. Or, rather, where his feet  _ should  _ be. Instead, there is a giant hole from his feet to just below his knees.

Terrified, she decides she’d rather see his glare than something that will once again question everything she knows.

To her shock, the fire is gone in his eyes and he’s setting the pistol at his hip. Oddly, there’s one on his chest too… and his other hip… and she thinks there’s two more handles sticking off his back as well… How many guns does one man need?

His gaze fixes on hers, only this time, he’s smiling, though there's not a single note of pleasantness in his eyes. “Now then. I do apologize if my method scared you Señorita, but you seemed to be in distress. I cannot imagine how poorly those pirates must have been treating you but let me assure you, we mean you  _ no  _ harm.”

Huh, that’s… oddly polite for a ghost… Or is it?... Is it even genuine?...

He nods to the men and they start dragging her with them.

What do they think they’re doing?! She didn’t say she’d go with them!!

“Wha-?! Excuse me! Let me go!”

The man who’d been speaking doesn’t turn around, but she can now confirm he does indeed have 2 more rifles on his back.

“Now now, Señorita. Ordinarily, we would allow you the use of your own legs, but I’m afraid it is a fair walk back to La María and if we set you down to return you your dignity, you would drown. So, por favor, it will be  _ much _ simpler if you cooperate.”

She looks down and remembers that they can walk on water. These men are quite literally the only thing keeping her from drowning.

“W-well can I at least have my feet out of the water? It’s freezing.” The salt and cold was making her feet throb. He pauses and turns to look at her again. “...Sí. I think that is agreeable.”

He says something in another language, Spanish she thinks, to the men holding her and they discuss something for a moment. Finally, the larger of the two looks down at her. “Lo siento.”

“What does that-Ahh!” He quickly leans down and scoops her up in his arms. Once he’s satisfied with his hold of her, they start off again towards the ghost ship.

This day is incomparably the absolute worst of her entire life. Far too much stress and pain and confusing things that she can’t seem to explain.

_ ~For instance, if these men are after Jack… what do they want with me? _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Spanish translations:
> 
> Entender?=Understand?  
> Sí, Capitán. Entiendo.=Yes, Captain. I understand.  
> Que?=What?  
> Por favor=please  
> Lo siento=I'm sorry


	12. Phantom Pains

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> ***~For instance, if these men are after Jack… what do they want with me?***

**(Carina’s POV)**

The ghosts carried her all the way to their ship, her hands still tied together. They don’t speak or even look at her.

...None of this made any sense. Ghosts can’t walk. Dead people can’t walk or talk or fire guns. Men also can’t walk without feet and yet…

_How?!_

_No sense_ . It makes _no_ logical sense!

None of this is possible. Even if someone were able to walk on water, her weight should have tipped the balance and made both of them drop into the water.

The… man... holding her seems to be missing his left shoulder and some patches along his left side. If she cranes her head, he seems to be missing a large chunk of his back on his left side too…

He doesn’t look at her at all though. Just shifts his arms to hold her tighter as a warning when she leaned too far in his grip.

All of these men had what looked to be fatal wounds, yet they moved and talked like living, breathing men.

For a moment, she wonders if they’re actually breathing or not. Unfortunately, she can’t tell. Not with this group. She can’t feel the tell-tale rise and fall of his chest against her side, but she can almost feel a soft breeze of breath from him…

...Or can she?

...She’s hallucinating… That’s it. It must be. The pirates had actually shot at her and she’d slipped over the edge of the cliff. Now she was hallucinating as she drowned… yeah… that has to be it…

Oddly, that idea didn’t feel any more or less comforting than what she thought she could see, hear and touch…

They finally approach the hull of… what did he say it’s name was again?... The Mary?...

Their group stops at the side of the ship and starts conversing in Spanish with one another.

The man holding her looks up the side of the massive hull.

“Oficial Reyes? ¿Cómo se supone que debemos mover a la dama a la cubierta?”

The other man who had been dragging her along for a while speaks up. “Sí, ella tiene los pies cortados. Ella no puede escalar.”

The man they’d be addressing turns to look between her and the vessel as the others keep talking.

But somehow, talking to these… people… would be like acknowledging what she believes-no, what she _knows_ to be wrong. There are no such things as ghosts, so she will not talk to them… Then again…

Finally, her patient starts to wear out. She is here and they are clearly talking about her. She should get to know what it is.

As she opens her mouth, finally having the courage to speak, suddenly she was moving and… spinning?

Before she knew what was happening, she finds herself upside down and staring at the water.

...Wait… What?

“¡¡Señor!! ¡¿Qué estás _haciendo_?!”

Her breath catches as she starts moving again.

_~Wait… did one of them-? HE DID! One of these… whatever they are THREW ME OVER HIS SHOULDER!_

“W-E-EXCUSE ME, SIR!! Just _what_ do you think you’re _doing_?!”

She recognizes the voice as belonging to the shooter from earlier.

“Stop squirming, Señorita. This will be over quickly.”

His hand releases her legs, but keeps them tucked into the crook of his arm as he starts to scale the side of the ship with ease. The ones below her look incredibly shocked and uncomfortable.

Her eyes narrow.

No. No she _refuses_ to sit here and allow him to carry her like a sack of flour! How _dare_ he handle her like this! She had never really considered herself a ‘proper’ English lady, but this was still intolerable behavior.

———————————

**(Magda’s POV)**

Inside the Mary, Miguel glides through the musty halls.

His gut is twisting itself up in knots. He’d made quite a severe offer to the Capitán to get him to agree to his plan. If Reyes didn’t return with Jack or the Señorita _soon_ -!

An odd sound hits his ears and he moves towards the wall to hear it better.

It...It’s a woman’s voice! The same from the beach by his estimate. A smirk spreads across his face when he hears her. She sounds healthy. Uninjured.

But, far more amusing, is _what_ she’s saying…

Turning on his non-existent heels, he hurries to the stairwell and climbs to the top deck. Her shouting is louder up here and all heads are turned to the side.

Bracero is at the railing, leaning over to watch whatever was happening with extreme amusement.

“ _PUT ME DOWN YOU SON OF A LEPER’S DONKEY!”_

Looks are exchanged around the deck. A lot of the sailors are trying to hide their smirks as the Lieutenant looks at the railing, appalled.

Miguel smirks as she continues to scream at him. She does not really curse, but she certainly gives him an earful and it is most _definitely_ _not_ ladylike at all!

As Reyes appears over the side, a pair of sailors lift him and the lady over the rail. She immediately tries to get out of their grasps as they take her from the officer.

Reyes pulls himself over as she continues to scream and demand to be released.

_~...Well, at least it shouldn't be boring while we wait for the boy to bring us Jack…_

Lesaro moves forward. “Por favor, Señorita, but I _must_ ask that you calm down. We are not going to hurt you. And I can assure you that Officer Reyes’s behavior in no way reflects on the rest of us.”

The Lieutenant shoots the young officer a look as he leans against the railing. Reyes just shrugs in response though. The boy still likes to live dangerously. Always flirting with the line of trouble.

“I don’t care and _no_ I won’t calm down! Why the hell am I here?! I thought you were after Jack!”

Miguel watches as his shoulders lift and slowly sag.

“In due time Señorita, but the Capitán would like to speak with you first. Come.”

He turns and the men move her with them towards Salazar’s cabin.

As she moves, his gaze wanders over her clothes. The dirty thing had clearly seen better days, but it was a nice color for her. By where the shoulders land, he can guess it was made for someone bigger than her, but was able to be tied tight enough to stay on her tiny frame.

Her steps are sluggish and she is constantly picking up her feet. Perhaps she is cautiously trying to keep from dragging them over the deck while resisting their pull, but it is more likely that they are injured.

His gaze momentarily meets hers and there’s something in it. An intelligence? A fiery defiance? Yes… both…

There’s a will in her to be seen. To be heard… She may appear terrified now, but that will no doubt fade quickly.

She won’t put up with being moved around for very long.

Their gaze holds for a bit, each one sizing up the other as she is led into the Capitán’s cabin. Neither is willing to break eye contact until she has to.

Blinking, he watches where she had been for a minute before turning to find Officer Reyes staring at him with a smug grin on his face.

He moves over to join the younger man, “{proud of yourself, Vincent?}”

He shrugs. “{There was no good reason not to, so I did. I did not touch anything inappropriate and her face was nowhere near anything inappropriate on me. I defy you to tell me how I’m wrong.}”

Miguel rolls his eyes. “{Well, at least you got some fun out of all this. And it sounded like you got to fire one of your rifles.}”

“{Yes, Isabel got to live again. She works as well as she ever did. Thank you again for convincing the Capitán to send me for that job, Miguel. I owe you.}”

“{Just don’t push your luck with your newfound trust and freedom. There is only so much my reputation can save. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I need to go check on my patients and gather some supplies for my new one.}”

Reyes chuckles, muttering under his breath. “{I _knew_ you would notice.}”

——————————

**(Carina’s POV)**

_~Who_ is _that man?_

There was something in his gaze that felt cold, calculating but she can’t say for certain if it held any malice…

He had no legs though… _none_! Her conversation with Henry had come to mind when she saw him. ‘Have you ever seen a one-legged man?’...

No. And now, here was a man with no legs. From somewhere around his hips and going down was completely gone. Yet, his head had turned. He’d looked at her. She could swear she even saw amusement in those eyes!

But… That’s impossible… _All_ _of_ _it_ …

The harder she thinks about it, the harder it becomes to explain.

She doesn’t even register where the specters are taking her until it gets noticeably darker around her.

Finally taking in where she is, it looks to be a cabin that was probably once beautiful and luxurious.

But now, dirt and salt have stained the glass of the bay window on the opposite side of the room. The large desk is burnt and charred. It’s rather miraculous it’s still standing.

Heavy but ruined curtains hang at the edges of the windows.

The men holding her arms stop in the middle of the room. “Capitán. Oficial Reyes ha regresado.”

A figure turns towards them, hair floating about his head as though standing underwater. Through the strands, she barely catches a pair of eyes staring back at her in the dimming light of the setting sun.

Nodding, he sets down a piece of paper and turns to face them. “Eso es todo. Déjanos.”

The men leave and Carina is left standing there with her hands still tied in a dimming, musty old cabin with who she thinks they said was the captain.

He leans heavily on a cane and a rapier he happens to be using like a cane as he approaches her steadily.

“Welcome, Señorita, to the Silent Mary. I, am Capitán Salazar…” He stops maybe 2 feet away from her. “...Would you like to sit down?”

His breath was ragged, as though he hadn’t had water in days and it sounded like every breath was sheer agony. It takes her a moment to realize what he’d asked her. Looking around the office, she can’t say she entirely trusts the furniture to hold her.

“Umm… No. I… I think I’ll stand…”

His chin tilts up, his lips, coated in some mysterious black liquid, are parted slightly as he takes her in.

After a moment, he uses his cane to turn a chair out to her. He sighs. “Sit.” His voice was calm, but there was something in his tone and expression that hinted it was more of a polite order.

Her eyes narrow. He had clearly heard her. “...I said no. If it is all the same to you, I would rather stand.”

His eyebrows raise at her defiance. She has no reason to obey him. He may be a captain, but she’s not military, she did not choose to be here and she also doesn’t have to obey him just because he’s a man.

“I am not asking. Sit.”

Fine. If he wants to try and pull rank when it doesn’t affect her, perhaps a bargain then. Her wrists had started aching some time ago anyway.

She holds up her hands to him. “Untie me and I’ll sit.”

He stares at them for a moment. “...No.”

“Why not?”

“Because I do not know who you are yet or what reason you had for even _considering_ sailing with a pirate. So, until I know you are _not_ a pirate yourself, your hands shall remain bound, Señorita.”

Her eyes narrow. He must feel awfully confident in having the power here if he’s willing to tell so much without much of a fight…

“...I needed a ship. That’s the one I got. I didn’t pick it, or the company aboard. Now untie me.”

“No.”

“But I answered your question.” She retorts.

“No. No, that is not enough for me to believe you. Now, let us try again. Begin with your name, Señorita.”

 _~A bit arrogant… and he_ hardly _needs to talk down to me like a confused child!_

“I don’t have to tell you _anything_.”

He huffs, lips curling up in amusement. “This is true. You could avoid my questions. Pero, then I would have to treat you as a prisoner. I’m afraid La María’s brig took immense damage, as you can no doubt guess, so I am afraid, if you are unable to provide me a reason to think otherwise, I am afraid I will have no choice. If that is the case, you…” he points his hand at her, still gripping his rapier, “will end up sharing a cell with the other pirates…”

Her stomach sinks low into her gut as his words sink in. Jack’s crew had turned out to be completely harmless, but… could she really risk that chance with pirates she hasn’t met?

There’s a change in the color of his eyes and she blinks at it in confusion as he speaks again.

“So, Señorita… Do you still want to hold your tongue?...”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Spanish Translations:
> 
> Oficial Reyes? ¿Cómo se supone que debemos mover a la dama a la cubierta?=Officer Reyes? How are we supposed to get her to the deck?  
> Sí, ella tiene los pies cortados. Ella no puede escalar.=Yes, her feet are cut. She can't climb.  
> ¡¡Señor!! ¡¿Qué estás haciendo?!=Sir!! What are you doing?!  
> Capitán. Oficial Reyes ha regresado.=Captain. Officer Reyes has returned.  
> Eso es todo. Déjanos.=That is all. Leave us.


	13. The Man with No Legs

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The moment we have been waiting for!! :D Finally get to see these two formally meet!!  
> ***“So, Señorita… Do you still want to hold your tongue?...”***

All at once, 3 things happened.

First, Carina’s blood drains from her face. Suddenly, all the scoffing she had done over the last few days at the old stories of pirates was shattered. She actually has no idea what these new pirates might be capable of and willing to do.

Second, her smile and confidence was dashed to pieces. This simple conversation now has much higher stakes.

Third, her hands not only drop, but pull back towards her body.

The hints of a smile are present at the edges of his lips and it is most definitely not a good one.

If she looks at his whole expression, that smile almost disappears inside one of almost… bored smugness. Like a combination of arrogance and pleasure that she was bending to his wishes.

“So, Señorita…” he taps the chair with his cane, “won’t you have a seat?”

She looks down at it for a moment and she almost takes it, her feet are still killing her after all… and yet…

Her eyes go back to his, where that whole expression sits.

Looking back at the chair, she realizes it’s a power move. If she sits, he can block her from leaving. He can tower over her while he asks his questions.

 _~…No… No that is_ **_not_ ** _how this is going to happen…_

Looking back at him, she can more than guess he’s not using his sword as a second cane for fun. He appears to genuinely be in a lot of pain…

She doesn’t really know this man.

This next move might very well get her killed, but she won’t sacrifice her place in the room so easily.

“I will sit and answer your questions, but only if _you_ are willing to sit and answer _mine_.”

He freezes. Genuinely stops moving, except for his hair which continues to hover. He doesn’t even blink for a good couple of seconds as his mind contemplates her words.

A sense of pride and shock fills her as he actually turns and sets his cane on the table to pull another chair over to face hers before taking it. His cane returns to his hand and before she really knows what happened, he’s looking up at her expectantly from the chait. There is about 2 or 3 feet between the chairs.

When her brain catches up, she takes a seat in the other one.

“Let me make things perfectly clear Señorita… any time you refuse to answer a question, I will refuse one from you. There are some questions you must give me an answer to or I cannot, in good conscience, believe you are innocent in this and I may still have to detain you with the other pirates.”

He takes a deep breath, “however, if you cooperate, I may also consider the possibility of providing you with more… desirable accommodations…”

After a moment, she nods. Unfortunately, some things will have to be given up here to keep her safe…

“Now, start with your name.”

This is innocent enough. She is not exactly known outside of Saint Martin. “Carina Smyth.” She opens her mouth to ask him a question but he holds up a hand. “I said nothing of taking turns Señorita. You have delayed these enough as it is, so you will answer a few of _my_ questions first. If you are not a pirate, why were you sailing with them?”

A bit annoyed, she contemplates her answer for a minute. Finally, she settles on something she can live with. “I did not choose it, but I was… not well-liked in the town so I asked Henry to find us a ship and he chose that one.”

He lifts his chin, eyes narrowed. “Who is Henry?”

“The one who was on the beach with Jack and I. In town, he had claimed the ship he was on was attacked by ghosts and he was the only survivor.”

After a second, he nods slightly. “And he is your lover?”

Her eyes go wide and she sits a little straighter, annoyed at how her voice shifts here. “What?! That’s _hardly_ any of your business!”

Annoyingly, he only shrugs before continuing. Fortunately, most of his questions were not so invasive but it did make her more skeptical of him and his motivations.

She did, thankfully, manage to avoid telling him about the map for the time being but he clearly knew that what she had kept to herself was important. On the other hand, her questions had been about his current state and he had not been shy about answering. Though every answer was seeped in bitterness.

Mostly, her questions had been about what his existence was, rather than how it had occurred. Apparently, the portions that appear missing to her are perfectly visible to these men, but the pain from losing them is constant.

Eventually, he holds out his hand to her and she stares at it for a moment. “...I’m sorry. I do not understand what you want.”

He looks tired. “Your hands, Señorita.” Hesitantly, she gives them to him and he pulls over a knife that had been, apparently, sitting on the desk this whole time. It actually looks to be in great condition. The metal still has a shine to it… How did she not notice it earlier?...

The Captain holds her hands in his, surprisingly gently for his appearance. She takes this chance to examine the differences between her hands and his. His are a good deal bigger than hers, but more noticeably is the feel of them. Strong, yet incredibly dry and rough. The pale skin of his hands seem like paper, dipped in wax but very unevenly.

They feel… strange, and… _wrong_ . Perhaps that is simply because the mind learns some things to be fact. A range of possibilities on all things within which things can be considered ‘safe’ and outside of which dwells the unknown. Things with the potential to be extremely _unsafe_ …

No. She is an intelligent woman. Men and women have been able to expand the range for what can be considered safe throughout their entire existence little by little. It is how sailing came to be. Surely, she could steel her nerve and handle _this_.

The moment feels incredibly long, but ultimately only lasts a few seconds as her hands are carefully cut free from their bonds. He takes a moment and turns them over in his own, examining the deep-set grooves and reddened skin of her wrists.

His thumb slides over the sensitive, scratched skin and she reflexively pulls back as they sting against the touch, a soft hiss leaving her.

In response, he grips her hands a little tighter, not letting her pull away. “Lo siento… Well, Señorita… I am inclined to believe your story. Wait here…” He pulls himself up and goes to the door, speaking with someone outside before limping back to the chairs, though he doesn’t sit.

He says nothing for a moment, as he stares out the window. Finally, he turns to her. “Since you have inclined to share some of the truth, I shall share one last thing with you… You will be staying with us for the time being. Given the results of our conversation, you are here more for your own protection… When we have dealt with Jack, we will see you safely to a port of your choosing…”

Her brow furrows in confusion. If she is _now_ here for her own protection, why did they originally bring her aboard?

Before she can ask though, there’s a knock at the door.

“Entrar.” The captain calls out.

To her surprise, the man without any legs that she’d seen earlier enters and stands not far inside the doorway, a bag in his hand. “Capitán.”

After his address, his eyes move to her, though he remains facing his commanding officer who takes it on himself to do introductions.

“Señorita. This is Officer Magda, La María’s medical officer. Officer Magda, this is Señorita Smyth.”

With a polite bow from the officer, he moves forward to the empty chair across from her, setting his bag on the table.

The way he walks is very strange… it is not quite gliding or floating. His body sort of bounces not unlike men who have their legs walk… and yet… no legs…

_~…Wait… why is he here?_

Confused, she looks between the two men. “Pleasant as it is to meet you, why are you here? I am not ill.”

Both men stare at her, as though she had started tweeting like a bird out of nowhere. It lights a spark of irritation in her. They are the ones not explaining things. She is hardly the abnormal one.

After exchanging a glance, the doctor apparently decides to answer.

“Indeed, you do not appear to be ill, Señorita. You are, however, injured are you not?”

She looks at him in confusion for a moment before remembering her wrists. Was that what the captain had done after freeing her hands? Gone to get his doctor over some irritation? That hardly seems necessary.

“My wrists will heal in a few days. I hardly think some tight ropes merit a professional’s attention.”

If they had been surprised before, their expressions now would make one wonder otherwise.

They are stunned into silence for a long moment. The doctor takes in her wrists before his eyes meet hers again. “In fact, Señorita, while I fully intend to treat your wrists, I was under the impression that the Capitán meant for me to bandage your feet.”

“I’m _sorry_ _?!_ ”

Who told him he had any reason to go near her feet?!

His head tilts at her as he pulls something out of his bag. “I do not know why you are surprised. You all but limped across the deck. Why do you think Officer Reyes carried you up the side? Did you think we would not notice?”

She glances down at her feet, suddenly very aware that they were red and sore and freezing. She had a visible bruise on her toe from running in the woods earlier and she had been sitting a bit oddly to keep them off the floor as much as possible.

By the time she looks up again, the man is finally seated across from her and is putting a salve on her wrist.

As with the Captain, she tries to pull her hand away in surprise. Perhaps more surprising, is that he actually lets her go.

Watching her carefully, he holds out his hand to her again. “It is just a salve to help with the pain and ease the damage, Señorita. Por favor, if you will allow me to finish…”

...Odd… The two men are very different from one another. Even more so from the pirates she had gotten accustomed to over the past few days. Even different from all the men she has ever encountered…

After a moment of debate and deciding he didn’t really have a reason to be giving her anything other than what he said he was, she gives him back her hand and lets him finish.

Her feet though, are a different matter that leave her far more nervous as he finishes bandaging her wrists…

She is contemplating how exactly he’s expecting to do this without them seeing under her dress just as he turns his chair, this places his body closer to hers. He leans over to take her foot and she almost kicks him as he turns it so he can see her foot.

Carina can only stare at him as he just decides to hold her feet like this _isn’t_ incredibly indecent and inappropriate. She tries to pull her foot away when he reaches for something in his bag.

Once again, he doesn’t stop her but fixes her with a look. By now, the Captain is focusing on the papers sprawled across his desk. The doctor seems very unamused by this repeating incident but, to her surprise, he doesn’t get annoyed. Rather, he leans back in his seat and looks at her completely bored.

“Señorita, I can understand your discomfort, but I need to examine your foot. Do not forget that I am a doctor. If you can cooperate, I can assure you that this will be over quickly.”

_~...He does have a point…_

With so many people thinking she’s a witch everywhere she goes, she wasn’t very keen on human interaction.

In addition, having been on her own for so long means she has never really had the money to afford a doctor.

The very _idea_ of going to see a doctor was entirely reserved for major medical situations like gunshot wounds or being seriously ill. Fortunately, she had never experienced the former, and had only been seriously ill one time.

A little embarrassed, she moves her foot back to where he’d had been holding it before and lets him work on it. She doesn’t meet his gaze though. Rather, she takes note of the fact that her foot isn’t resting on his lap, but is being held gently by one of his hands.

Briefly, she wonders if it’s just easier to work that way. Or…

Now her mind was rushing with confusion. Can she touch what’s _supposed_ to be there? The captain had said they could still see those areas of their bodies, but nothing about touching. Do they even know if it’s possible? If she can touch areas invisible to her, why doesn’t he just set her foot on his lap? If not, then how can he walk? If there’s nothing physical to hold his body up, how can he walk around or stand up straight?

Carina lets out a startled noise when he pulls a thorn from her foot she hadn’t even been aware of. “Lo siento.” He fixes a cloth with some chemical on it and, before applying it, casually warns her, “this will sting, but try not to move.”

She doesn’t get much time to brace herself before he is cleaning her foot with it. He wasn’t wrong. It stings a _lot_!

So much so that Carina can feel tears stinging her eyes.

_~Don’t cry! You can’t cry in front of them after how you’ve managed to hold your ground already!_

She bites her tongue and tries to think about something else.

Her mind drifts to her diary, still strapped to her leg, and the still incomplete map.

It helps. Somewhat. She barely manages to get through him finishing that foot and working on her other one.

Silently, she wishes he’d be a little less thorough so he can just be done already.

This has been a _hell_ of a day for her and having her wounds treated by something she _does not_ believe in is not helping matters.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Spanish Translations:
> 
> Entrar. = Enter


	14. Pained Soles

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Miguel will not leave me be. He's making Silva and Cormac jealous with all he's getting me to write for him...
> 
> Long chapter again

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have like a million ideas for this one right now, and blocking on ideas for Silva and Cormac. Sorry. I am trying to find my inspiration, but, as long as I have this one, I'm gonna keep it going because we all know it won't really last XD
> 
> Translations at the end. Not necessary to know what the bigger sentences mean at the moment they are said  
> Also, if anyone speaks Spanish and thinks my translations are crap, they probably are. I have to use google translate and it seems to really hate altering words to demonstrate feminine pronouns. As I don't know the language very well, my attempts to fix things usually manage to make it worse because google sucks. Again, sorry. I am trying

**(Miguel’s POV-backing up just a little)**

He had been waiting for someone to fetch him. Much as his Capitán has come to enjoy the suffering of his various prisoners, if she was truly who Miguel figured her to be in all this, the lady should end up earning some leniency.

Hernandez had been quite surprised, however, to find the doctor to already have his bag prepared and guessing what he had come to him for.

He pauses on his way out of the Medical Wing when he is asked a question. “{Sir? If I may, is this why many of the other officers were always so adamantly opposed to playing cards with you?}”

Miguel chuckles. “{In a way, yes. However, I believe you may be mistaking what exactly ‘this’ is. Perhaps, when this… unsavory mess we are in is resolved, I will teach it to you.}”

There was a light in the young man’s eyes that reminded him of when his childhood friend had said his father had finally decided to take him on a fox hunt with him for the first time.

After leaving the Medical Wing, it took perhaps a minute, maybe two, to be standing in the Capitán’s cabin.

Up close, sitting across from her, he finally has the opportunity to study her, albeit, with glances, so as not to be obvious.

Her wrists are red and the skin raw from the abrasive ropes that had been used to bind them. Otherwise, her skin seems well-cared for.

As he gathers some salve, he holds her hand in his own, not wanting to hurt her wrist. Despite the tension in her hand and arm, he finds it almost pleasant. Her skin is soft in his dry and pain-riddled hands.

Her fingers are long and so much thinner than his own with only a few callouses. Not a life of hard labor perhaps, but by her short fingernails and the dirt under them, it is clear that she has not led a life of comfort either…

But all this information registers in a blur to him. A momentary blip of gathering the information and storing it for later. None of it fully settles in the forefront of his mind. Not yet anyway. It will resurface if he ever suspects her of lying to him. Or perhaps in moments of boredom with nothing else to do.

Her hands quickly pull back as he starts to apply the salve, the work so monotonous to him that he didn’t even register it at first. It doesn’t take him long to convince her to return her hand to him though.

Much as she was obviously uncomfortable touching him, the look in her eyes said pain was the reason she’d recoiled, not disgust.

Throughout his work, he could feel her suspicion of him in her gaze, but he remains focused on her wrists as best he can. She seems a reasonably-intelligent woman at least, so that will make her stay aboard La María more tolerable. She is far more nervous though when he moves on to her feet.

As he’d suspected, and Reyes had said, her feet have some decent damage. All of it seems to be surface damage, but damage nonetheless.

By the lack of calluses, she had been running around without shoes, but normally would have been wearing them. The skin is softer on her feet than on her hands.

Miguel takes in the numerous small cuts and a few small pieces of wood stuck in her flesh. As he grabs his supplies to clean it up, she pulls away from him once again.

Recognizing a different look from earlier in her eyes and the tension in her posture, he resists a grin as his eyes meet hers.

_~Ahhh… so she is shy as well??... Interesting…_

He once again talks her into cooperating except she doesn’t want to look at him this time, choosing instead to watch the floor.

He has to bite his tongue to keep silent as he cleans the cuts and pulls the thorn from her foot. Intelligent enough to comply with reason, rather than needing to be convinced with soft words and a kind smile. Far more preferable to him than having to deal with a woman who behaves more akin to a scared kitten than an intelligent human being.

She tries so hard to tough it out and act like the medicine he applies to clean her cuts doesn’t hurt her but it’s more than obvious that she is fighting tears.

He glances between her and her foot a few times as he works, absent-mindedly wondering if they had maybe managed to steal any dresses among the various trunks they’d taken off pirates ships… Although there was a good chance that any woman’s garments from a pirate vessel would have incredibly low cuts or be in several pieces, if not riddled with some foul disease.

Finally finished with cleaning both her feet, he works on bandaging up the second. His fingers do not linger too much on her ankle as he holds it still to do his work.

Once he’s done wrapping it, he makes sure it is tied and gently sets her foot back down to the floor.

“That should be all. {I will need to check on her wounds in the morning, but that should hold for the night. She can take a bath in the morning but I will likely need to redo the ones on her feet immediately after.}”

Salazar gives him a nod. “Bien. You are dismissed.” He quickly gathers his things, Miss Smyth’s confused look not escaping him.

Halfway to the door, he pauses and turns back to her, giving her a bow. “Buenas noches, Señorita. I will see you in the morning.”

He ignores her surprise as he leaves the dark cabin for the darkening evening of the top deck.

—————————

**(Carina’s POV)**

The doctor leaves the cabin and she blinks for a moment.

_~Wait… did he say he’d see me in the morning? Why? Are my wounds really so bad that they need to be checked first thing in the morning?_

She is too busy watching where the doctor went to notice as the Captain apparently calls someone in from outside.

She doesn’t notice him until he is in the middle of the room and the two are talking in Spanish. Her mind spaces as she takes in the new man’s equally strange appearance. He seems to be wearing the same uniform as the doctor, save for the gaping hole in his chest that has her utterly baffled and fascinated at the same time.

An especially harsh rap of the Captain’s cane on the old wood gets her attention. Both men are staring at her.

_~Was he addressing me?_

The Captain smiles, though there appears to be no joy or real friendliness in it. “...Now that I have your attention… This is Officer Santos. He will be showing you where you will be spending your stay with us.”

“I advise you not to attempt to leave your cabin Señorita. There is nowhere on this vessel you could hide from us if you did.”

_~Well, that certainly gives a different mood to this. Is there a particular reason for why he’s expecting me to try and escape tonight?_

True, it is not as though she has much reason to stay here, other than the lack of food or a rowboat to get anywhere else, but it is still quite strange that he is so suspicious already… Unless that is simply a part of who he is by this point in his… Can she even call it a life?...

The officer, Santos was it, ends up standing in front of her without her really catching him moving closer until he is right in front of her chair.

Perhaps equally surprising, is him offering her his hand. She decides not to take it though. She has no interest in appearing like any weak and feeble woman who can’t take care of herself.

As she pushes his hand away to stand, she doesn’t see how the look in his eyes changes for a moment. The next time she looks at him, his gaze is lowered to the floor in what would be considered respectful in many places. His hands are behind his back, which he straightens.

With a curt nod of his head, he directs her to the door. “If you will follow me, Señorita…”

He leads her out on deck, where it is already night time. The sun has obviously set more than half an hour ago by the color of the sky.

The officer walks just a step ahead of her, all but next to her really, and guides her below deck.

As they approach the stairs to go down into the belly of the ship, she realizes that in the unlikely event all of this is not a trick of her imagination and they really are real people somehow stuck between life and death, they may still be intelligent enough to trick her and use her weaknesses against her…

With this in mind, she fights the urge to slow down on the stairs, biting her tongue to keep a straight face as her feet sting with every step. Instead, she tries to play it off as more being careful to avoid the more rotted or already broken pieces of wood.

Hesitantly, the man offers her his hand again and she makes sure to walk by as though she doesn’t see it. He is turned away from her by the time she reaches the bottom step, guiding her down the halls to their destination.

Carina does her best to remember each turn through the halls as he takes her to a door in a hallway. With a knock, he heads inside, talking to the man inside in a low voice. Though as she couldn’t understand the words she did hear, Carina isn’t entirely certain why he’s bothering.

“¿Estás seguro de que la dama debería quedarse aquí, Diego?”

“Dudo que ella lo moleste. Ni siquiera podemos hacer eso.” **  
**

Taking in the tiny space, it’s in an odd state. Much of the furniture looks to be torn between weathered and an absolute wreck. The sheets and mattress, for instance, appear clean enough, but the bed frame looks damaged enough to be cause for concern. Random items throughout the room match this disconnect.

There are various books in the room, some sitting around on the floors and others on a desk.

The two finally stop conversing and the one in the room, who, most noticeably, has a rather large piece missing from his neck, nods as he looks at her. He gathers a few things and heads for the door.

His gaze is sharp as it holds hers on his way to the door. She almost looks away but something in it holds her attention. There’s a defensive wariness in his gaze. A dislike? Or perhaps a simple distrust of her… Nothing she isn’t honestly used to by now, but, for some reason, his wariness surprises her…

She holds that look for as long as she can. Not until he turns away does she lose sight of it. There is something deep in it. Some bit of information that she is missing…

A throat clearing gets her attention. It’s strange how utterly normal it sounds as she turns to find the officer who brought her here watching her. 

“Officer Moss has agreed to let you use his bed for the time being, Señorita. I advise you to get some rest. It is getting quite late.”

As he moves to pass her, a familiar pain in her stomach flares up.

She can hear the door open when she decides it can’t hurt to ask. Worst case is that he says no. “Officer? I… I wonder if I might be pressing my luck to ask but… well…”

It feels ridiculous to ask. Based on the state of the ship, there’s a good chance the answer will be no, simply because they don’t have any.

Unaware of how long she’d paused, she’s a bit startled when he speaks up. “...Yes?...”

“...No… Nevermind. It is nothing…” She turns back to examine the bed, though she can hear that he lingers in the doorway for a minute before leaving.

Carina decides against undressing for bed. Even without these men she doesn’t know, the Captain still said there were pirates aboard. Not to mention, if any of these men have a sense of decency, they won’t just go looking up a lady’s dress, so it would be better to keep it on and keep her diary hidden for now.

There’s a smell in the air as she gets under the blankets, but it seems safe enough. She sighs as she tosses and turns with the passing of every minute.

As she turns once again, a light shines in her eyes and she realizes there’s a small hole in the wall and the light is from the moon. Not big enough to see out of and not even big enough to allow enough light to write by.

...However…

Reaching under her dress, she pulls out her chronometer. On her old dress, she’d managed to sew a pocket or two, with much difficulty she would admit, but she had had to ditch it on the long boat.

Opening it, she looks through the hole as best she can. The only certainty is that she can’t see Orion or Cassiopeia. But there’s enough light to read the chronometer. By her last calculations, she can guess the time difference between here and London.

_~Somewhere between eight and half past ten o’clock at night… I could get a far more accurate estimate if I could see more…_

She allows herself to lie back down on the bed, clutching the chronometer in her hands.

Her mind wanders for a moment. From helping Henry escape to almost being hung to being on that pirate ship. And then having to swim to shore in the frigid ocean after having to remove her dress in spite of Jack’s incessant commentary… No. It does her no good to think beyond that. It will only upset her further.

Even with the Captain answering some of her questions, she still doesn’t have enough to rationally explain this supernatural nonsense…

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Spanish Translations:
> 
> Bien=Fine/good  
> Buenas noches=Goodnight  
> ¿Estás seguro de que la dama debería quedarse aquí, Diego?=Are you sure the lady should stay here, Diego?  
> Dudo que ella lo moleste. Ni siquiera podemos hacer eso.=I doubt she bothers him. We can't even do that.  
> (Perfect example of my google translate problem. Input it into the translator as "I doubt she will bother him" and this is what I got)


	15. The Land Without Logic

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Wow! sorry it has been so long everyone. My finals start this week so you can imagine I have been busy. I actually finished writing this a few days ago, but it took me a few days to have the time to edit it, and trust me, it needed to be edited. As a reward for your patience, here's a longer chapter than usual

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There is Spanish in here, but it's only once so it's not worth adding this at the bottom but here:  
> lo siento=I'm sorry  
> Consider that a teaser ;)  
> Where we were last:  
> ***Even with the Captain answering some of her questions, she still doesn’t have enough to rationally explain this supernatural nonsense…***

**(Carina’s POV)**

…

… …

_ ~Where am I?... Why can’t I move? _

Carina struggles with the sudden heaviness of her body. Just trying to open her eyes felt like trying to lift a cannon.

There’s something… music?

Yes, yes it sounds like music. Violin, perhaps?

~ _ It’s…  _ **_beautiful_ ** _. _

The unfamiliar song plays crisp and clear in the otherwise tense silence. It draws her into its mysterious and jovial tune.

But it’s not enough. Closer! She  _ has _ to get  _ closer _ to it.

It takes a lot of effort but she finally manages to pry her eyes open.

When she does, she finds herself staring down into a very strange scene. Marred by fog, she appears to be looking down at a party of some sort.

The people are too far away though. She can’t make out any of them. By the flowing skirts, spinning in time with the tune, it appears to be a rather nice party. Formal dancing, probably incredible food and wealthy company.

What a strange place. By the distance from her to the floor, it almost seemed like she was sitting on top of a dome over the party, looking down on all the guests.

The harder she looks at any one thing, the harder it is to tell anything about it. The color of every dress seems to change with each glance at it.

Curiously, she attempts to reach out, see if she can touch one of them.

Her attempt is marred, however with what appears to be glass… stranger still, she appears to be laying on it.

She attempts to lift her head to look around, but finds this to be as laborious as trying to open her eyes had been.

The song comes to an end and a sting of pain goes through her with it. Carina opens her mouth, moving it to try and reach the musician below and ask for another song, thank them, something.

Alas, her voice too, fails to obey her without a fight. Fortunately, she gets one of her wishes as another tune starts up. This one is slower, more somber. At once, she stops every attempt to move or speak, just to listen.

Growing up an orphan, raised by the church, she had heard plenty of songs, though many repeated often. They were all played on organs and sung as hymns. Any other music she’d heard were in the streets, from the streets but at a distance, or on a ship. Though the men she’d heard play on the ships were decent and could sometimes carry tunes, they were rougher than this.

The strength they used to pull the bow over the strings was probably far greater than this, producing a more grating, heavier sound. She desperately searches the room for the musician, trying to see if how he plays matches her theory.

Her curiosity is piqued as she searches and searches. Finally, she thinks she spots them. Though there seems to be a fog over the glass, likely caused by her breath, though she sadly cannot lift her arm to wipe it away, it appears to be a man, at least by the clothes.

Tragically, she’s too far away to tell if he holds the instrument more delicately than the sailors she’d seen previously had.

Carina attempts to press her face closer to the glass for even the slightest chance of a better look, but such movement seems to still be unavailable to her.

Heaving a frustrated sigh, a large, foggy spot on the glass is formed, and she closes her eyes, resigning herself to just enjoy the music.

It’s a somber, nearly haunting tune by nature, but there’s something about it that swells her heart with hope… Though why or what for, she cannot say.

A realization hits her and her eyes open, far easier this time, and she stares at the glass, still foggy. She breathes a puff of hot air on it and watches it fog up until the dancing below is no longer visible.

_ ~...That’s… odd. A normal thing but then-? _

Her foggy spot on the glass fades back to what could count as ‘normal’ and she frowns, holding her breath.

Sure enough, it doesn’t clear at all, so she releases her breath.

Once again, it fogs over. Carina wonders why one side is so constantly covered in fog and hers is not. It does not feel particularly warm or cold to her.

Something moves beneath her, different from everything else. For one thing, it doesn’t move like a person, and secondly, because it was quite bright even through the fog.

_ ~Is-Is that a bird? _

Oddly, the party-goers seem oblivious to it as the little creature flutters this way and that between the dancers.

As it moves in her direction, it’s little tweets grow louder. It settles on some kind of ledge, perhaps a wooden beam, but she can’t make it out as the fog thickens in the area around the bird.

It’s rather adorable, bright. Its white feathers stand out the most in the fog. There’s some black feathers too, but she can’t make out if they are in a pattern or not.

Its little tweets are as clear as the violin as it seems to chirp along to the melody. It’s body even seems to be swaying to the song below.

Such a sweet sight it was, Carina’s eyes start to burn from watching, though that may be from how oddly-bright the bird is. It must be glowing, though that doesn’t make much more sense than anything else right now.

It nearly falls from the beam in its swaying and Carina giggles, surprised when sound actually comes out, but far more surprised when the bird turns to look directly at her.

The bird tilts its head in confusion, clearly trying to identify either her, or the source of the noise, if in fact it cannot see her.

She smiles at it though, and she watches its little head tilt.

A moment or two passes between them, and the little bird looks down at the party and takes off to go fly around it once more. A flash of disappointment hits Carina as it goes, but she smiles for it nonetheless.

The song on the violin still plays loud and clear through the fog and glass, as though it were only a few feet away.

She closes her eyes again to just listen to the song.

After some amount of time, a new sound joins the music. It’s deep, a low note perhaps, but Carina cannot place the instrument.

Confused, she opens her eyes to see a very bright circle in the middle of the floor below her.

As she focuses on it, it does not get marred by fog as the others have, rather, it seems to get bigger, and brighter, with each passing second.

It expands further and further, until it touches someone. Immediately, they seem to catch fire and Carina loses her breath as the growing light proceeds to touch and ignite more of the dancers. The people, oddly, seem completely unaware of this, going about their party as normal even as others are completely consumed and burned to ash.

As it expands out, Carina soon realizes that it’s also expanding upwards. Panic sets in and she attempts to force her body to move. Annoyingly, it doesn’t respond, still ridiculously heavy.

The more it builds, the colors change. Inside the bright light, emerges something. It appears very dark at first, and may even be moving as the light expands.

Around this strange shape, emerges a bright red ring as well, which seeps outward in a pattern she can’t distinguish from this distance.

All the while, this strange intrusion continues to grow, like a puddle in the street on a rainy day. 

The center mass moves, and its shape becomes clearer, more defined. Though the blurry mass quickly appears to settle on a form, it’s not one she recognizes. Sharp points, roughly the same size in a line. It’s not infinite, it stops at the edge of the mass.

_ ~There’s a matching set facing it as well-!! _

Carina’s breath catches in her throat as the shape continues to take on the guise of a monster with massive jaws and blade-like fangs.

A sound leaves her throat, like a short scream she didn’t have enough air for. And, to her horror, the monstrous head amidst the contrastingly angelic light, turns to stare directly at her.

Panic sets in and she forgets what to do for a moment as her gaze locks with its own. With a roar, the white light expands rapidly, as in an explosion, and the entire remainder of the party is consumed in a matter of moments.

This time, a scream does manage to leave her throat as the monster surges forward, heading her way.

Instinct tells her to flee, but nothing works. She has not put in the time to get her body mobile, and now, it may be too late. What manner of restraint could be causing this?!

Carina looks back down as the beautiful music is disrupted with another roar, but it is a smaller sound which catches her eye.

The bird. The little one from before. It seems to have escaped the monster and is attempting to flee in her direction.

Her heart aches as she watches the little bird try to escape. Very quickly, it makes a sharp, strange turn and manages to avoid the snap of the monster’s jaws.

In the limited space below her, the bird mysteriously disappears, but the monster presses forward, getting closer and closer.

The creature quickly loses interest in the missing bird, as though it had never been there, and rushes towards her.

She fights to move her body back to stand up. Perhaps avoid a direct attack, at least on its first strike. With one strong push, she manages to move an inch, but her entire body screams at the attempt.

Her breaths are short and fast as now it is pain that renders her immobile in the face of imposing doom.

Despite its proximity, she still can’t tell what exactly it is that’s approaching her.

Closer…

Closer… She still can’t move and panic sets in, her chest tightens and her head feels light and numb as less and less air gets into her lungs.

She continues to squirm and fight to move. Her body screams at the pain from the last time she tried.

Closer.

It keeps coming.

Closer and closer.

The monstrous face approaches the barrier that separates her from this strange scene.

Closer. Inches perhaps…

… 

~ _ …Nothing?... Wait! _

Time feels slow. A noise catches her attention and, in just a moment, something bright flies into the side of the black and hideous mass like a cannonball and everything explodes.

Carina screams, pulling her arms in front of her to protect her from the blast and the glass.

She wakes with a scream, gasping for breath as her eyes are suddenly snapped wide open and she sits up.

After her breathing calms down, she looks around the small space.

A ruined room with disproportionately intact furnishings…

Some part of her had fallen asleep hoping the ghost ship and the inexplicable dead, but walking sailors had all been a dream, but they weren’t…

As she calms, she tries to recall the dream she’s just woken from, in hopes to make some sense of it.

Carina fights to remember the details but they are quickly fading. The only thing she can clearly recall was that there was a foul creature of some sort, and there was someone playing the most beautiful music she had ever heard in her life.

The more she contemplates that last part, the more it confuses her though… 

Carina has always believed there must be a logic to dreams. Like the mind taking time to look through every scrap of knowledge a person possesses to put together a solution to a problem or recall a problem in which the answer to a current issue may reside.

Or, if they are perhaps random, then they are based entirely on information the dreamer already possesses. It cannot conjure things they have no knowledge of.

So, if dreams are really based on knowledge she possesses, as she has always theorized, then how could she come up with something like that? If the music was truly unlike anything she has ever heard and she has never even seen a party like that before, then how could she produce them in a dream?

Perhaps her mind was reproducing a song from so far in her childhood that she can no longer accurately recall it, and her mind has simply altered it to make it seem more pleasant… Yes. Yes, that seems sufficient…

Sighing, she brushes her hair out of her face.

Something big jumps up on her bed out of nowhere, “AAAHHH!” Her heart jumps into her throat until she gets a good look at it.

_ ~... What is going  _ **_on_ ** _ aboard this ship?! _

There’s a cat on her bed… There is a living, breathing, healthy-looking cat… on her bed…

“Wha-? Where did you come from??” Internally, she chastises herself for talking to a creature which is incapable of speech or even understanding her words.

However, the little creature wanders over and smells her, seemingly as curious about her presence as she is about it.

A knock comes from the door. “Senorita? May I come in?”

That sounds like one of the men from yesterday, though she can’t quite remember who.

“Oh, yes, you may.”

The door inches open and the one whose cabin this is steps in, the one missing a big piece of his neck. He eyes the cat on the bed and sighs, pushing the door open to reveal the other officer from yesterday with a tray in his arms.

_ ~He’s not the one who brought me aboard, but he did bring me to this cabin… What was his name again? It started with an “S” I believe. San-something. Sant-a? Sant-o? Santos! Right! _

In the time she spent contemplating this, Santos had walked over to her while the other officer took the cat into his arms. “Lo siento-uhh, I mean, my apologies, Senorita. Despite his size, this one is able to fit into quite a lot of places. He normally sleeps next to me, in here. I apologize if he bothered you. He likely did not realize that you were not me.”

She blinks in surprise as it settles in the man’s arms, eyes blinking sleepily.

_ ~Is it going to just fall asleep like that? Lying on its back in his arms? _ ...  _ Ghosts aren’t logical but at least up until this point it was simple. Dead things moving on a dead ship… Why can’t things just make sense like they’re supposed to? _


	16. Difficult Questions Lead to…

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Yo! Sorry it has been so long!! Things got crazy... everywhere. Well, anyway, to celebrate the new month, even though I'm in America and things are nuts, I have decided to post 3 chapters in one day to apologize for how long it's been. 3 stories. 1 chapter each. The Black Mamba (this one), The More Things Change, and In Love & War.
> 
> I hope not to take as long next time to post a chapter. Tensions rise between Carina & Doctor Magda

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ***~Is it going to just fall asleep like that? Lying on its back in his arms?... Ghosts aren’t logical but at least up until this point it was simple. Dead things moving on a dead ship… Why can’t things just make sense like they’re supposed to?~***

The officer takes the cat from the room before she can ask any more about it, leaving her with Officer Santos.

He had, at some point, set the tray of food on the desk, and was now standing with his back straight and stiff against the door, hands behind his back and facing the window over the bed, unmoving and emotionless.

A bit strange. Does she truly need a guard while she eats? But perhaps this is normal aboard navy ships. Perhaps it’s a custom unique to this ship… or perhaps it is neither. There is really no way to be certain. This is her first time on any navy ship, even if _this_ one _is_ dead.

She slowly steps over to the food, enticed by the delicious smells and she tries her very hardest to keep her stomach from making any noise.

Taking the seat at the desk, she’s grateful when it doesn’t break under her. The officer doesn’t even turn his head when she sits, nor even when she starts eating.

The food is quite delicious. Carina doesn’t even bother taking time to figure out what it is. The moment she attempts to calculate when she last had an actual, cooked meal, nevermind how long it’s been since she’s eaten anything at all… 

That conjures to mind all the running she’s been doing lately. Her body has been screaming for a proper meal for days, but fear and running for her life must have suppressed it so she finds herself all but inhaling the food.

As she finishes, she notices how the plate and cutlery are just as odd as the room. Though she’d have expected things to be broken or ruined beyond repair, these seem worn, but in good condition. And yet, there is something in her mind that finds them off. Perhaps because the entire ship is a literal floating wreck and yet this is what she'd expect to find on a normal, though perhaps civilian, ship… It is difficult to say.

The officer still doesn’t move the entire time and she glances around, wondering what exactly he’s doing here. Is he here so she doesn’t try to escape? That’s the only logical conclusion she can find at the moment.

Having some of the water, she sits on the bed, unsure of what exactly is supposed to happen next. She finds herself with a partial answer as he sets the lid back on the tray to take away. He leaves the pitcher of water though, thankfully.

He calls something through the door that she doesn’t recognize, and the one who had removed the cat opens it. She hears him lock it behind his friend and then their footsteps retreat down the hall.

With a sigh, she flops down on the bed, staring at the charred ceiling for what feels like an hour, but she doesn’t check her chronometer, so who can say?

Eventually satisfied they were leaving her alone for a while, she reaches under her dress for where she usually hid her diary.

 _Usually_ , being the key word. She is soon pulling up the material, making for quite an indecent sight and staring at the empty straps that are not holding her diary.

Her heart beats loudly in her chest as she turns over on the bed, eventually climbing off it as she pulls at blankets and the pillows. Her search turns up nothing as she ducks down to look under the bed. Perhaps she was reading it last night and it fell under?

… No.

Carina looks around the fairly small space and tries to recall the previous night. She’d had it. That much is certain. Finding her charcoal, she recalls making notes last night. She’d had it… out. She must have fallen asleep without hiding it.

All well and good, except, that doesn’t explain where it _went_.

——————————

Across the ship, in the Medical Wing, Officer Magda sits at his desk with a tiny leather book in his cracked, aching hands.

He flips through the pages carefully. The book is clearly old. He’d hate to damage it.

The ink is faded, and there are signs of water damage but everything is still legible. It appears to be in Italian.

His lips turn down, an insistent scratching in his throat as he attempts to read it.

Old memories he had thought long forgotten resurface with each word he translates. Memories of an old tutor his father hired to teach him French, English, and Italian. He never truly mastered Italian or French. It was never fluent, and it annoyed him immensely that English was the one he had been the best at.

At least he could hold conversations in French. Well enough to visit the country once or twice without hiring a translator and talk with Reyes in it now and then. But Italian… not really. Words, and badly-spoken sentences that made him seem infantile when he attempted to speak it were the best he could manage. He was better at reading it.

Now though, he regrets not practicing more and forcing himself to master it. From what he can tell, the writing is exquisite. Intelligently-written, though the hand-writing is atrocious. A small, rasping chuckle leaves his charred lungs. His chest tightens horribly as he recounts his mother’s words. ~* _{Why do intelligent men have the worst handwriting? You would think they would have better control over their hands.}*~_

A groan causes his head to snap up, spotting one of the pirates rolling around on his bed. He’s holding his stomach and appears to be out of it. 

Sitting up for a better look, the whispers start again. Dark, and disturbing, like haunted birds that hover nearby, just outside his sight and only speak up at times like this. His dead, dry muscles clench and tighten as he watches the patient complain.

Out of nowhere though, an odd force seems to pull his head to look away from him and further down the room. There, he spots Manolo watching the man as well, quite concerned. Their eyes meet for a moment and Magda gives him a nod after a bit of thought. Better to let his apprentice get some more experience.

As Manolo goes to check on the pirate, he returns his attention to the book, the voices oddly silent now.

He combs through it for a bit. From what he can tell, it’s all astronomy. Maps of constellations. Effectively, it seemed Galileo was trying to make a map of the heavens much like others have mapped out the world.

It’s not easy to decipher. There are a number of things in the book he cannot translate. The indent on the cover is confusing as well.

Perhaps even more confusing, is the different handwriting. Someone has been writing and making calculations in this book in English. None of it is distinct. Clearly, only the one who wrote it would know the meaning, though they helpfully translated a few of the lines in the diary, so they must at least be able to read Italian… 

Several things about this book are a mystery to him. Luckily, there’s someplace he can go to get answers… 

——————————

Carina spends a lot of time tearing her bed apart as she looks for the diary. All she can find though, is the ruby. When she does, she sits down on the bed, staring at it.

It’s the most necessary part to help get to the end of the map and find the Trident, but it’s not the part she really wants right now. Her own notes are in that diary. _Her_ life’s work is in there. The Trident may be the key to her own accomplishments, but she needs to preserve her own work, and her father’s legacy… _Her_ legacy.

She’s not sure how long she spends staring at the jewel, but the sound of her door unlocking makes her jump and hide it under the pillow.

The door opens to reveal the doctor. The man with no legs. Some of the others have pieces missing, but his are gone from the hip down, making him easy to recall. His gaze is unreadable as he approaches her with a bag in his hands. It looks familiar, but she can’t say where she’s seen it before.

He approaches her silently, but there’s a cautious edge to his walk as he pulls the chair over from the desk and sets it facing her.

The Officer takes it, and Carina can’t help but stare at how odd a sight it is to see a man sit when he has no legs.

The… man, watches her carefully as he sits back in the chair. “...Sleep well, Señorita?” There’s an odd inflection to his voice. There is no sincerity behind his words. Only a faint indifference and sarcasm.

She eyes him warily, letting some of her annoyance slip onto her face. If he’s going to be like this, then there’s no reason to answer him.

A moment passes between them and he tips his chin up a bit at her attitude. When it passes, he shrugs, “no matter. I need to see your feet.”

She hesitates at first, but soon lifts her foot to his non-existent lap. Taking it in his hands, he unwraps the bandages quickly but carefully, and she watches them fall into the empty space his legs should occupy.

He’s silent the entire time he works on her foot, redoing the salve and rebandaging it when it’s finished. Moving on to the second one, he repeats the process. This time though, when he finishes unwrapping it, he looks up at her face, where she’s refusing to look at him, and speaks.

“The good news is, you will recover. The damage to your feet is not severe…”

With a small roll of her eyes, she stares at him. “Is this the part where I ask you what the bad news is?”

There is no humor in his eyes as he watches her. Still holding her foot in his hand, he leans forward slightly. “I suppose, but then my answer would be that the bad news is that your feet are not healed enough to escape me if I were to ask you a few questions.”

Silence fills the room, her heartbeat pounding extra loud in the deafening stillness that follows. What does he mean? What questions? What does he intend to do if he doesn’t like the answer she gives him?

Her whole body tenses, hoping to pull her foot out of his tight grip. She waits for him to start speaking. Start asking his questions.

The moment he opens his mouth, she pulls her leg back. At least, that’s what she attempts to do. Unfortunately, he catches her and keeps a tight hold on her ankle.

There’s a haunting glow to his eyes when he speaks. “ _What are you thinking?!”_

Carina clenches her jaw in an attempt to appear more intimidating, as well as, hopefully, subside her shaking. “Release me.”

“No.” His answer is instantaneous. Instinctual even.

Carina finds herself drawn to his eyes. They’re… _red_. It is not some trick of the light because the window is shining light on a different part of the room. His eyes are _red_ … and it is perhaps the most terrifying thing she’s ever seen.

The more she considers it, the less it is about the inhuman nature of the color, and more about the silent presence they carry. Something about his gaze, with those eyes, is making her blood freeze in her body. She’s never felt so cold in her life.

What’s worse about it is the sheer lack of logic in it. How is it even possible? Was it something in the medicine? A lack of sleep? Why was she so scared that she actually could. Not. Move?!…

After what felt like an eternity, he suddenly speaks, but her eyes are stuck on his.

His voice is hoarse, and yet, quiet, almost soft somehow. His voice is quiet enough that no one outside could possibly overhear, yet loud enough that she would have to lie to say she didn’t hear him.

“…You have been keeping secrets Señorita and I am not leaving this room without answers.”


End file.
